


Ruin at the Door

by Carbocat



Series: The Skeletons of Life [2]
Category: Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 - Malloy
Genre: Coma, Companion Piece, Head Injury, Memory Loss, Pierre & Anatole: Canon Divergent, Unwanted Houseguest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-23
Updated: 2018-05-03
Packaged: 2018-12-19 01:48:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 27
Words: 70,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11887356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carbocat/pseuds/Carbocat
Summary: I couldn’t shake this idea, so here is a companion piece to I Pity You, I Pity Me.Setting eyes on Anatole again was nothing like Marya expected it to be.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place in the first chapter of I Pity You, I Pity Me between Hélène telling Pierre to leave and Dolokhov showing up in his room at the Inn.

Marya Dmitriyevna knocked on the door, gathered in gold and scarlet scarves and her fur-lined shawl, a pensive yet impatient frown on her face. It was three quick raps against the colored glass and she waited on her heels. She wished to speak to Pierre.

It was the Countess that opened the door, eyes lined with a restless and tired exhaustion, smudged and red with old mascara and puffy with an odd little emotion that passed too quickly to determine its meaning. Surprise morphed into annoyance, and then she smirked to Marya.

It was a base and cringing thing that cracked her face into two and set Marya’s teeth on edge with airy flirtatious tone, “What do I owe this pleasure?” 

“You were not expecting me,” She observed down her nose, brushing off the flirtation with a wave of her shawl. “I wrote ahead.”

“You did not write to me.”

“I should think not,” She sneered. “You offer nothing worth my noting.”

“Except my presence at this moment and your time,” Hélène pointed out. “What is it that I may help you with or do you wish to spend all evening insulting me on my front porch?”

“Nonsense, I will insult you from inside,” She replied briskly. Hélène could almost say that she was joking if she did not think Marya meant every word of it. “I can think of many while you send a servant to fetch Pierre for me.”

“Pierre is not here.”

Hélène weighed the options she had at her fingertips before plucking the most entertaining one. There was a routine to the old dames of Moscow, a mundanity to them that was predictable and dreadfully _boring_ but it was entertainment nonetheless.

Marya was traditional, old-school like script well-loved and unchanged. Hélène needed the routine.

Hélène craved the normalcy of pulling strings when it felt as if hers had been cut down with her brother. She needed the amusement and entertainment, the manipulation and the power, in the same way she needed air, and water, and _Anatole_.

She moved to the side, allowing Marya over the threshold.

It was a well-placed and deliberate smirk on her face, one that felt foreign and easy all at once after days of blank empty smiles for the sake of hope. Turning from the closed door, she observed Marya.

She observed the tightness around her eyes and the barely concealed anger sat red on her cheekbones. She sighed, pouting her lip, “And my dear Anatole, I have not seen his eyes in many days. There is no one here for your wrath.”

Marya’s eyes narrowed a fraction of a degree and Hélène took as much pride as she could for being the cause of this annoyance, “There is you.”

“I am not worth your noting, remember?” She mocked, floating around the old dame like a tigress playing with her food. “I do not control my brother, Marya, your wrath is misplaced. I only entertain his pleasures.” 

“You did nothing to stop the ruin of a young girl.”

“Neither did you.”

“I put a stop to it.”

“It was too late.” Her voice was a forced lightness in the tension stretched between them as she swept across the room in a grand gesture, an undercurrent of fatigue hidden in her every action. When Marya’s glare turned to a harsh scowl, Hélène’s smirk became less wooden, “What is the problem, may I ask? Does little Natasha hate her godmother now?”

Marya’s jaw twitched and her eyes swept the room in irritation, landing on the unopened stack of letters addressed to Pierre, “Pierre has been away for a long time.”

“Busy,” Hélène answered, her smirk dropping back into a blank mask and critical eyes as she followed her gaze. “You know how he is.”

“It is said that Fedya Dolokhov has disappeared to Petersburg with your troublesome brother.”

“That is being said,” Hélène echoed. “As I have heard all the same rumors as you, I do not need it repeated.”

The dame turned to her and said with no trace of anything in her voice. It was a simple fact, “Pierre is staying at the Inn.”

Hélène stopped, cocking her head to the side. That wasn’t right, deception was not a part of Marya’s role, her script, “If you knew that then what brought you to my door?” 

“The window.”

“Explain your reasoning.”

“That ridiculous green coat in the window,” She snapped, stomping across the room, curling her fist into the fabric of Anatole’s coat slung forgotten over the back of the couch in the front room. “Anatole Kuragin is many, _many_ things but he is not careless with his possessions or his appearance. He would not so easily forget such a beloved article of _absurd_ clothing.”

Hélène’s jaw worked its way out of a mechanical clamp and her voice came out defensive and _wrong_ , “Maybe he did not have time to keep track of all that he beloved! Your dear Natasha is still here, yes?”

“He did _not_ love her!”

“You do not know anything!” She snapped, snatching the fabric from her, gathering the coat against her chest. “This has been enough, Marya, I will be seeing-“

The knock at the door startled them both. Hélène moved faster than Marya, swinging the door open so hard that it bounced on its hinges with a horrid whine before her voice tripped over itself, “Dr. K-Kuznetsov.”

“Countess-“

“Pierre is not here,” She said, eyes hard as she started into the doctor’s eyes. “Marya Dmitriyevna is.”

“Oh,” He said awkwardly, avoiding Marya’s watchful gaze. “I can come back another time?”

It was a calculated risk, one that Hélène was aware of and cared so very little of the consequences when she gestured the doctor indoors, “You know where to go.”

“Of course, Countess,” He said and disappeared up the stairs.

Marya watched his retreat critically and Hélène broke the silence with a believable lie, “I am having an affair.”

“I am sure you are,” She snorted disapprovingly. “Just not with that doctor. Why is he here?”

“For somebody who hates the gossips, you sure act a lot like them.”

“You are deflecting.”

“So, what if I am?” She asked. “This is my house, I will do as I please. Leave, now.”

The script was changed in a way that Hélène hadn’t anticipated and she did not care for it. Marya moved faster than she thought possible, making like she was moving towards the door before she pivoted on her feet and rushed up the stairs. Hélène followed on her heels, catching only fur-lined fabric.

Marya stopped in the doorway, frozen by the sight of careful doctor hands as they rested against a slender pale figure. Sicken with a nausea so sudden and dizzying that she gripped onto the doorframe just at the sight of dirty white blond hair, and bandages, and fingerprint-like bruises up a pale neck and across a strong jaw, “What is the meaning of this?”

“I won’t allow you to hurt him,” Hélène hissed venomously, shoving her back and standing in the doorframe as to block her from the sight. “He is in no state to be challenged.”

She asked, “Will he wake?”

“He is harmless to you-“

“Countess, he is pale and waning,” She stated coldly, eyes drawn passed Hélène’s plump shoulder, to the slack face of the man she disliked so very much and the bruises under the bandages. There was odd sense of satisfaction in Marya’s heart and it sickened her. “Calm your hysterics and tell me-“

“I will tell _nothing_!” She snapped. “Tell you _what?_ Will he wake, what happened? _What?_ What is it that you’d like to know, Marya, so you can run off and turn my brother into Moscow’s last cruel joke?”

“Huh?” She continued, taunting. Her eyes like a wild blaze of fire, crackling and without warmth. The exhaustion taking over before she could stop it. “Do you plan to tell Bolkonsky, cruel like his father, and my brother can be dead instead of… of… this?”

“Fate is crueler than you,” Hélène told her in the aftermath of her anger. It was sometimes hard to view her as the young woman she still was. It was hard to see her as anything but the maturity and stoicism she held in comparison to a brother so whimsical and childishly short-sighted, but this moment. She looked lost, and young, and Marya’s maternal instinct longed to embrace her. “You do not have to worry about Anatole any longer.”

Her voice was void of any emotion to not reveal that the Countess has any, “The doctor says that he will die any day now, he is no problem of yours.”

“He will not,” Marya said after a long pause in which she gave Hélène enough time to gather her wits and clear her face of that awful expression. “He is a stubborn bastard, he would not do me the courtesy.”

Hélène snorted, an incredulous startled laugh busted from her lips, “They are wrong about you. You are not strict yet kind, you are an awful woman.”

“I am an honest woman,” She shrugged, watching the doctor change bandages and Anatole somehow looked smaller and smaller. He looked like a child. “I believe that you were correct when you said that I need to go. I am wanted elsewhere.”

It was not until they were both at the door that Hélène spoke, voice an empty whisper, “You didn’t ask what happened.”

“I did not need to,” Marya stated in her cold and stiff way. “Pierre is not here.”

“No, he is not.”

“It was the unopened letters,” She said, answering the unasked question as she gestured to the pile collecting dust on the table. “You are a gossip and you cannot touch even his mail, he has done you a wrong greater than one could imagine.”

Hélène curled in on herself and Marya crushed the desire to wrap her arms around her by wrapping her shawl around herself instead. Hélène’s voice was weak in comparison to everything else, “He will get better, I believe it.”

“I am sure that he will.”

“I will send him to Petersburg,” She stated though her eyes disagreed strongly with every word. “You do not have to tell anybody.”

“It will stay between us.”  

“Marya,” She called, stopping her just outside the door. A question heavy in her eyes. “You spoke to Pierre before – before all of this. What was it that you discussed?”

There was something in Hélène’s voice, something so _knowing_ and heavily, and tired. Marya did not have to answer, they both had a clear idea of what that exchange contained and what lead to but she answered anyways, “I told him that all will be ruined and told him to see his brother-in-law.”

“Is this the outcome that you desired? You never did like my family.”

Marya was quiet for a moment, reflecting on what it was she wanted when she went to Pierre those days ago and the satisfaction in her heart at the sight of a prideful man cut down. She considered her anger still buzzing in her chest and the hurt at seeing her goddaughter so ruined, she did not know what it was that she hoped that happened but she knew that some part of her liked this one.

She did not vocalize that. She said instead, “I must be going if I wish to speak to Pierre.”  


	2. Chapter 2

Pierre dreamed.

He dreamed a lot, he always had.

He dreamed of happier times, of the family that he had loved and lost long ago. He dreamed in the comforting hues of his mother’s hazel eyes, in the earthy tones of her laughter, her love, of the camping trips with his father and brothers. It filled him with melancholy, with longing for what would never be again.

He dreamed a lot but now, they were soaked and tainted with red. Like the sticky red coagulation on the cherry wood of his desk, in feathery blond hair, on hands so small and smooth and a dress in ruins. Like the red on the gold statue in candle light, when there was so much red that it looked black and it haunted him.

It filled the corners of his eyes, it clung to his sleep and his wake, and it tortured.

He woke up each morning in a bed unfamiliar and an ache in his back, unrested and tired, to screaming. It echoed in the hollows of his skull, it pierced his ears and ruined his sleep.

It haunted. It mocked. A personal hell for his ears only.

Everything was soaking in red, in the blood that he spilt from a pretty blond skull. He drank, and drank, and read red-stained pages, and drank. It all tasted like iron. And the screaming, it never leaves.

It was not the worst of it, it was just the loudest.

No, it was the whimpering that truly got him.

It was the lull in the screams and the retreat of the red that he heard it so clearly. Like a whisper in his ear, an undercurrent to life. It was the clear and concise memory etched onto his eardrums of the exact moment, the exact hit, the calm in the space between heartbeats that the screaming, and the begging, and that stupid prideful mask of an honorable man crumbled into what Anatole really was, a child.

He’d stopped, just stopped moving, and fighting, and shielding himself from the onslaught of hit, after hit, after hit, and Pierre could see that moment on the back of his eyelids each night. The whimpering started there, for a brief interlude between the screaming and unconsciousness.

Whimpering like a child afraid of a dark room, and Pierre would remember those tales of Aline Kuragina during his and Hélène’s engagement.

Anatole, that stupid child, and the irrational fear of the sleep. The way she spoke so happily with a motherly fondness of the little begging, and the nightly fights, and how Hélène, so sweet, would crawl into his bed to comfort him.

He would drink, and study, and write, and wonder if Hélène was still fussing with Anatole’s pillows. And then, he’d drink more and let bitterness and the guilt eat him alive, let the screaming and whimpering, and the visions of a cracked skulled torture him for hours, and hours, and hours.

He’d leave the Inn occasionally, when food and alcohol ran low or he needed ink. He wandered down to the shops, ignore the words of gossips, and he’d feel the ghostly wisps of sleep and wonder if he was still there. How long had he slept? Was he still sleeping?

They could have pretended that Anatole was asleep and his actions were that of a demented nightmare but he could allow himself that. Instead, he tormented his mind with horrors of pretty features wasting away into starvation, of Hélène’s cold eyes falling dead as her brother, of what would become of himself if or when this fell the rest of the way to ruin.

He woke from a stupor to rapid knocking on the door. His notes and blood-stained books strung around the room, and the bed unmade, empty bottles on cluttered tables, and food left untouched. He wanted to ignore it but the knocking didn’t leave.

His head was already so loud that he dragged himself out of the blankets to the door. He blinked owlishly at the morning light, “Marya?”

“Pierre,” She greeted, wrapping her shawl tighter around her from the chill on the air. “May I come in?”

He stepped aside and allowed her in, letting the door close behind her, “I – has something happened?”

“You are not at your home,” She stated, turning her nose up at the mess in the room before eying him. “You do not appear to be well, Pierre.”

“I am – I am fine,” He waved his hand in the air in some sort of gesture as if it expressed how fine he was. “There are – I am away, for my studies.”

“I am sure you are. How are those going?”

He gestured again and added a wordless sound with his mouth, he was so tired. “It is great to see you, Marya, but you do not make house calls without reason.”

“Yes, you are right,” She agreed. “I went to your house, spoke with your wife.”

Pierre’s face was purposely blank but his eyes read guilt like headlines on newspaper, “How is – how is Hélène?”

“Are you not corresponding?” She asked in a tone that suggested she already knew the answer. “She appeared distressed, exhausted.”

“Is that – is that only news forthcome from the manor?” He asked. “Did she – was Hélène…depressed?”

“No, there is still hope in her eyes,” Marya stated, sitting on the edge of the bed. Her eyes were critical and hard, her mouth turned into thin frown, and Pierre ran cold because she _knew_. “Your brother-in-law is unwell.”

“There was – I – he is alive?”

“For the moment, yes,” She replied briskly. “Natasha is ill though.”

“What?”

“I came to speak with you because Natasha is very ill,” She stated in a matter-of-fact way, smoothing the wrinkles of her gown. “Having poisoned herself with a bit of arsenic.”

Pierre’s jaw went slack and the air felt as if it was let out of the room, the whimpering grew louder in his ears. The screaming, a roar, “Will she be okay?”

“She woke me in the middle of the night and told me what she had done,” Marya replied. “I sent for a doctor straight away. She is out of danger now but still so weak.”

Pierre didn’t know what to say, filled with relief and dread all at once, but thankful Marya continued speaking, “You may see her if you wish, she sleeps most days.”

“I would like to visit.”

“Your brother-in-law sleeps, too,” She stated and the lull in the screaming ended. She observed the guilt eat his face, “I felt sickened when I saw him.”

“It was a monstrous act.”

“An effective one.” Pierre shot her a surprised look, expecting to find some kind of crass humor in her face but found none, she was serious. “Do not give me that look, Pierre, he is the cause of Natasha’s ruin.”

“Does that mean that he should die?”

“It would only improve my disposition.”

“Marya.”

“I told you, I felt sickened by the sight but I almost felt relief,” She told him. “I felt happy.”

“Marya!”

“He ruined my goddaughter,” She stated. “Natasha, she is ill, and weak, and Andrey has returned and he will not accept her back. You know the Bolkonskys, and you know what they will say about her and it all because of that stupid fool. It is only so bad that you did not end his life altogether.”

Pierre’s eyes were wide with shock and disgust, “I knew that you did not like him but, Marya.”

“I won’t take it back,” She stated. “It is misfortunate that his suffering has been prolonged but you cannot say that he has not caused enough problems that it is not warranted.”

“He is young and naïve.”

“As is my goddaughter and she was ruined,” She stated, voice harsh. “I wanted him gone from this town, this is better. He will waste away in a bed, he will turn ugly. It is just desserts.”

“It is cruel thinking.”

“It was a cruel act,” She stated. “God commits cruel acts all the time and we sing praises for him. He gave you the power and the righteous anger to do his will and rid us of that scoundrel.”

Pierre sat heavily on a chair at the table, he took a swig of the open bottle there, “You cannot possibly believe that.”

“But I do.”

“Marya,” He looked into her eyes and the stone wall behind them. She would not allow her opinions to be changed, it was losing fight but he’d felt compelled to fight it, “Regardless of how annoying they are, we cannot wish death onto the living.”

“I would hardly call that living,” She replied. “Even before, it was not living. Life is not one moving party to the next, and taking money from hands that should not give it. Life is not about your wiles, and wills, and dancing through it with no responsibly and no regard for anybody else. I do not know what that man, Vasili Kuragin, did to turn out children such as that but the world would have been better without it.”

“I will not change your mind.”

“No more than you could change Anatole.”

“He is changed,” He pointed out. “He is very changed, he is unconscious and possibly dying. That is a change.”

“And then my opinion of him will change if he dies,” She replied and then shooed the conversation with her hands. “Do you wish to see Natasha today? You appear…sober, more or less.”

“I would appreciate that, yes,” He nodded.

“Do not speak of Anatole if she is awake.”

The screaming came back in full force, and the whimpering, and the red in his vision. He wiped his hands on his trousers even though he knew the blood to be gone, “I would not do that to her or to him.”

She nodded once, “Good.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't actually set out with the intention that this would be multiple parts so I don't really know if any more parts are coming after this. Also I'm taking nineteen hours this semester so I don't when I will really have the time to write and I have a lot of half finished fics in the works so, bear with me. 
> 
> Mostly, this was supposed to just be Helene and Marya talking but I just really love Marya and view her as having this very black and white good/bad view of the world and Anatole definitely would not fall into the good category.


	3. Chapter 3

There were talks of feeding tubes.

In harsh hushed whispery voices that carried through doors on the silence in the air and echoed around the emptiness in a tired heart. There were talks of clinical reasoning in cold clinical words and there was hot venomous denial in a voice so renounced and vicious of a woman who could not look passed her own clouded judgement to see that the doctor was right.

The talks of wasting away and weight loss, and that twitching hands were no indication of better days turned into back and forth debates with no winners. And then it turned into screaming and yelling, and sometimes Hélène would cry but more often, she cursed and threw things. She’d smash glass to the floor and rip papers, and she would send the doctor away.

Feeding tubes made this a reality that she could not handle, did not want to. Feeding tubes meant that too many days have passed, meant that Anatole had not woken. It was not a long sleep, a nap, it was something worse than that. It was wrong, a nightmarish _wrong_ thing.

Anatole’s cheekbones grew more pronounced and hollow, and Dolokhov spoke with his eyes trained on the angular slopes of his pale wintery face, “I made an oath to protect him.”

The words were spoken aloud, neither addressed to Hélène nor to Anatole, who she insisted that they spoke to like he was a present consciousness in the room even when she herself often did not. His voice held a dull emptiness to it, a haunted memory of the exhaustion of war, “It is broken now.”

“You did not break anything, Fedya,” She told him, pausing in her reading of old bible verses that neither she nor Anatole would have cared for but she used to read to him when he was ill as a child so she chose to read now. “Least of all war-time promises.”

“It was an oath.”

“An oath is a promise, just with blood,” She shrugged her bare shoulders, looking to him now, “Anatole will not fault you and if he did, he’d be a fool. No one thought to see this coming.”

“I should have. He shot me.”

“It was a lucky shot.”

“It was a _wound_ ,” He spoke, beating his knuckles into the still-tender skin of his shoulder. “And Pierre spoke plenty of the monstrous things beneath his skin. We did not believe and Anatole is wasting away.”

“He is not wasting away,” She hushed, rubbing her thumb gently over Anatole’s sharp cheek. “He will wake soon, I know it.”

“The doctor is right, Hélène.”

“ _No_ , he isn’t.”

He forced himself to look away from his friend and to meet her eyes so broken and determined with his own cold empty ones. He kept his voice in the low sober pitch that it had become, “There will be naught to wake up if we let him waste to nothing.”

“It is-“

“Demeaning, yeah,” He hummed, his bones ached with a chill that would not leave him. “Painful? No more than the pangs of hunger that have surely taken him if consciousness was possible. He is growing weak.”

“We have a connection, of blood and childhood,” She told him, the denial heavy like determination in her eyes and her voice. “I feel it in my _soul_ that he will wake soon. It is not necessary to subject him to that when he will wake in a few days, I believe and it will happen. Anatole has never disappointed me.”

He snorted, “That is certainly not true.”

“It is,” She insisted.

“He does not have a few days, Hélène, too many days have already passed us,” He maintained, grabbing her hand so suddenly that it startled them both. He pulled it from Anatole’s face and place her soft palm against his chest, an even thudding beat and the count of every rib below her hand. “The desperate times are along us, Countess, do not allow your stubbornness to blind you.”

“You are one to talk,” She sneered. “You have not left that seat for anything other than to drink. Marya Dmitriyevna tells me that half of Moscow believes that you ran off to Petersburg with Anatole like some lover.”

He bristled at her barb and then dismissed it, she was looking for a fight about inconsequential things but he wouldn’t allow it, “When have you been speaking to Marya Dmitriyevna? You have left his side less than I have.”

“She stopped by, looking for Pierre.”

She did not find him,” She snorted. Hélène rolled her eyes, fussing with Anatole’s jerking hands so they were interlaced around a pillow. Like he was sleeping, it would becute if she wasn’t suddenly avoiding his eyes, “Hélène?”

She hummed, carding her fingers thought Anatole’s greasy hair and tutted something about a bath. Dolokhov’s eyes narrowed at the gesture, “Hélène, what did Marya find?”

“She knows, Fedya. I could not stop her.”

“She – she _knows_.”

“She has given me her word that it would stay between us,” She stated, done with her fiddling for the moment and staring into his eyes. “You do not have to worry.”

“Marya is – is the _biggest_ gossip in Moscow!”

“Marya keeps her word,” Hélène dismissed. “She does not even know about you.”

“You do-“

“I told her that Anatole will die,” She said plainly, her fingers tapping along with the heart beat in Anatole’s chest. “I got teary, I got irrational. I played my part, Dolokhov. Do not insult me.”

“I didn’t.”

“You _thought_ it,” She hissed at him. “You have lost faith in me but I know. Dolokhov, I _know_. I played the weak emotional sister, the little girl she thinks I am, because Marya would believe it. And I know that Anatole will wake soon.”

“It is the meantime,” He responded, letting his anger at the news of Marya dissipate into the air until a later time. “I know you do not want to cause him pain but it is the right thing to do, Hélène.”

“We have experienced worse hunger in bad winters than this,” She stated, staring at her brother in a way that made Dolokhov believe she had doubt in her words. “He will wake and I will have the servants make all of his favorites. We will have good days soon, Fedya.”

He sighed, “Hélène, listen to the doctor.”

She said nothing. He said, “Please.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just, everybody is in this now. I am allowing these characters to take me where they wish to go so we all know exactly the same about what is to come. 
> 
> Cool things: I have a good part of the next chapter written and Sonya is in it and she has yet to appear in any of my writing so, woo!


	4. Chapter 4

Natasha was very ill.

There was a waxy feel to the air, artificial and sticky, and it clung in the heat to Pierre’s skin, weighing him with the feel of snakes slithering down his bones. The farther he followed Marya down the narrow hall, the worst the uncomfortable feeling became. It was stifling.

She paused at a door halfway down the hall, pressing a hand flat against the wood and listening for a moment but when she didn’t hear a sound, she sighed. The door was pushed open and Marya ushered Pierre through it. The waxy feeling increased ten-fold, feeling as if it coated the back of his throat and the inside of his lungs, but it made sense with the number of candles lit in the room.

They lined the shelves and crowded the table in their various melting stages and color, filling the air with a thin warm line of smoke. Sonya’s back was to the door, staring into a large mirror on the wall, candle in hand. She startled at the sight of Pierre in the reflection, “Oh.”

She whirled around on her feet so quickly that the candle flame flickered and threatened to go out before she sat it down carefully onto the table and curtsied before Pierre, “Count Bezukhov. Marya Dmitriyevna.”

Marya nodded in acknowledgment to her and Pierre followed the gesture, “Sofia Alexandrovna Rostova.”

“You must call me Sonya, sir. Please.”

He nodded again, clasping his hands awkwardly in front of him as his eyes drifted down to the bed where Natasha looked so small engulfed in quilted blankets and heavy furs. Sonya spoke, more to Marya than to him, “She has woken twice today, still very weak. I got her to eat and to drink the concoction that you have made.”

“Very good, Sonya.”

“She has – she has asked about the prince,” Sonya breathed nervously. The air hung still in the smoke for a tense second before she clarified, “Oh, Andrey! She – she asked for Prince Andrey not, well not _him_. I did not know what to tell her.”

“Did you say anything?”

“She fell back into sleep before I had to.”

Marya hummed content with that answer, “Very good, Sonya.”

She left them alone for a while, slipping from the room to busy herself with the preparations of teas and coffees. Pierre stood awkwardly near the doorway before finally stepping farther into the room. He sat down in a wooden chair on the other side of the bed.

For lack of something better to say, “May I inquire about the candles?”

“Oh, yes sir.”

There was pause that stretched between them so Pierre cleared his throat awkwardly, “What of the many candles?”

That prompted another ‘oh’ from Sonya before she cleared her throat as well, a blush flaming across her face, “I was trying to see Natasha’s future. I know that it is silly.”

“How so?”

“Well, it is just superstition, isn’t it?”

He shrugged and she let out an indecently incredulous laugh, “But you study! You are the most studied man I’ve ever met so you must know that it is childish nonsense.”

“I don’t know everything,” He told her. “But I believe that it is never too harmful to try even if it is just to ease the ache in our hearts. What was it that the mirror told you?”

“Nothing,” She frowned. “I looked and looked, I followed the row of candles in the reflection and they just travel farther and farther into the distance. I see no end.”

“You did not see a coffin then?”

“I did not see a man either,” She told him. “Until you walked in.”

He blushed this time, allowing his eyes to find Natasha’s sleeping face among the blankets and the silk and took comfort in the peace look that graced her features.

Sonya followed his gaze as it turned to a frown, resting on the scar on Natasha’s thin arm from the bloodletting. She tutted at it, “I wish they would not have had used such a barbaric remedy.”

He nodded numbly in agreement but it was not that which he was seeing. His eyes were drawn to the speckles of blood dried dark onto the quilt beneath her elbow and he saw pale white clammy skin that was not Natasha. He saw a broken and tarnished head, and bloody blond hair, and he saw it all split open and apart with hit, after hit, and hit.

The screaming that had lulled into a deafly silence with the anticipation and dread of seeing Natasha but now that he was confronted with it, it was the whimpering that came to him.

“Count Bezukhov?”

His vision filled with nothing more than the scar on Natasha’s arm and nothing less than Anatole’s blood like black in the moonlight seeping into his study’s carpet. He felt his stomach churn with his guilt and his eyes filled with the red of blood spilt. He looked to Natasha and saw only the harm and the damage, the destruction he caused so easily to Anatole.

He was a monster being. He was-

“Count Bezukhov!”

He shouldn’t be here, he would only cause more harm. He was monstrous, he had destruction on his big, big hands and guilt in his consciousness. He couldn’t be of help to anybody, least of all Natasha, least of all Sonya. Marya had lost her head when she asked him to accompany him home, she-

“Pierre!” He startled violently when a small hand grabbed his and met the concern in brown eyes. She smiled shyly, “Pierre, Count Bezukhov.”

“Pierre.”

“Okay, Pierre, it was – was as if your eyes took you elsewhere,” Sonya told him, her hand still around his. “Are you okay?”

“I am fine.”

“Natasha will be okay,” She assured him, gently pressing the fingertips of his large hand to the inside of Natasha’s wrist. “Do you feel the beat? She is already so much stronger than she was.”

“I am sorry, it was my brother-in-“

“Nonsense,” She shook the thought from the air around them. “You have nothing to apologize for, no one blames you. Otherwise, Marya would have never let you through the door. She knows that you care deeply for Natasha.”

“I do.”

Sonya smiled at that, “As do I.”

Her smiled faltered after a moment, pulling down into a frown and then she pressed her lips together into a thin line. It was an unnatural fit for her face, weighing heavily and setting an aged look to her eyes. Her voice was barely above a whisper when she spoke, “Do you keep secrets, Count – Pierre?”

“I have been known to keep a few.”

“Will you keep mine?”

He nodded, “Of course.”

“I – I fear that I could have prevented this,” She told him, releasing his hand and falling back into her chair as if the guilt crushed her. Pierre followed suit, allowing his fingers to stay pressed against the beat in Natasha’s wrist. “Natasha, I found her letters from Prince Anatole and I read them, I knew – I _knew_ and I didn’t work fast enough to save her from this downfall.”

“You did what you could.”

“But I didn’t, you see,” She said in a rush. “I thought – I just, I thought that Natasha would see reason or that this was just a little childish flirtation between bored people and nothing would come from it but it wasn’t. And then – then he _wanted to marry her_ and she refused Prince Andrey.”

Sonya sucked in a shaky breath, squeezing Natasha’s other hand in her own before addressing Pierre again, “I don’t know how I could let this go so far.”

“You are young,” He pointed out. “The responsibly to see right and reason, it is – it is not your burden to bear.”

“It is neither yours,” She told him firmly. “I can see the way that regret clings to you and it is not your fault, it is Prince Anatole’s for taking advantage. He should know better.”

Pierre looked back to Natasha to avoid Sonya’s eyes because the regret and the guilt that clung to him was his to bear and his alone. He agreed with her, Anatole should have known better but it was he that listened to words of elopement and affair, and acted too slowly once he found out it was with Natasha. He was he that brought down the weight that cracked Anatole’s head, that put him wasting away in a bed, that – “You are a good man, Pierre.”

He shook his head, “None of us are good men.”

“I –“ Her brow furrowed. “Natasha’s health should not weight your conscious because she is getting better with every day and it is – Marya will ask you to speak with Prince Bolkonsky but it is not your fault if he refuses Natasha.”

“I-“

“It is the fault of that scoundrel,” She rushed out and then gasped fully at the words she had spoken when her emotion had been spent and she could see reason. “I did not – I should not have spoken ill of your brother-in-law, I mean no disrespect to yourself but-“

“Anatole was wrong,” He said in a voice gravely with the despair and the undercurrent of anger still flaring at the thought of Anatole’s misdeeds. “Anatole is a simple and stupid child and you are correct, he should have known better. He should bear the burden of-“

He has, _he is_ , Pierre’s mind supplied the words with barbs and spikes, and vicious visions of Hélène’s tears and Anatole’s slacked bruised jaw. His ears were assaulted with screaming, shouts. Anatole’s broken, desperate pleads, _What, what, don’t – stop, please. Pierre, please, you are – please!_

It stalked him like the worst of nightmares, the pleads and the begging and he swore it was so loud that Sonya surely must hear it too. It cracked into tears, and broke into yelps, and trailed off into whimpering and then silence.

He stood to his feet, removing his hand from Natasha’s arm like it burnt him, “I apologize, Sonya, I believe that I must – I must go. I wish Natasha a fast healing in the coming days and I wish that you forgive yourself.”

He breathed out, reaching around to gather his coat before realizing that he had not removed it, “You are too kind-hearted to carry such unnecessary guilt, it is unjust to weight on your heart.”

“And yours too, Pierre.”

He saw flashes of blood, splattering the walls and coating his hands. He saw Hélène’s ruined dress and her red fingernails. He felt the warmth of blood speckled across his face. He breathed out and offered her a brittle smile, saying nothing.  

He did not deserve her sympathy. He did not deserve anything but to be kicked out into the snow for his monstrous deeds, “I must be going.”

Marya stopped him on the stairs, an arm loosely around his bicep but it felt as if the grip was made of iron, “Where is it that you are going?”

“Back to my studies,” He told her. “I have visited with Natasha, I need to go back.”

“You look as if you have been struck,” She observed, passing the tray of teas and sugar onto a servant and followed Pierre down the stairs. She led him to a sitting room and forced him to sit down. “I know Sonya would never do such, so what is it that transpired to work you into this state?”

“Sonya is a charming girl,” He stated. “As is Natasha, and I am – I have spilt blood in a dishonorable manner and I see Natasha but all I can think of is that.”

“It will not stop,” He hissed, pressing his hands over his ears but it only served to amplify the screaming between them. “I am a monstrous being.”

“As I told you before, it was God’s will,” Marya told him, a comforting hand pressed between his shoulder blades but doing nothing else. “You have done no wrongs in this house, Pierre.”

“I _beat_ my brother-in-law half to death, he still lies unconscious.”

“And if he wakes then maybe he will learn from this experience,” She scolded him, shaking his shoulder and drawing him to his feet. “Nonsense, Pierre, stop this pitying nonsense now. You are much better than this.”

“I am not.”

“Yes, you are,” She tutted, pulling at his coat so it was in working order and then fixing his crooked glasses. “You are free of guilt in my house, if you chose to feel it elsewhere than that is on you.”

“I should not be.”

“Do not dwell on what has passed and look towards a future where you do not have to spend your days posting bail or cleaning messes of a fool that expects it of you.”

He gave her a tired look, “You cannot calm my guilt.”

“I am not trying to,” She told him. “Guilt is irrational, it is useless emotions for things that cannot be changed. Move onwards, Pierre, there is a war going on. We cannot dwell.”

“No, we cannot.”

“You will visit again?” She asked and when he offered no definite answer, chose one herself, “You _will_ visit again, Pierre.”

So, he did.

Marya on her way to market would accost him, drunk or sober, and drag him with her to hold her bags as she observed lemons and rosemary. She would talk and he would listen, and they both ignored the whispers of gossips.

Pierre would sit with his soft fingertips pressed to Natasha’s narrow wrist and feel the beat beneath them. He would listen to Sonya speak, of tales of candles and mirrors and the recount of Natasha’s increasingly growing waking hours. Pierre never went upstairs if she was awake, he did not think he would be able to control his face or despair if she asked of Anatole.  

He’d been on his way to the door when Marya stopped him and called him into the drawing room. She was holding a bundle of envelops, “I know that it is not of me to ask for favors, Pierre.”

“It is more demands with you,” He joked and she gave him a stern look but there was a sparkle of something like humor in her eyes. “I will speak to Andrey for you, Marya, for Natasha. You do not have to ask.”

Marya nodded once and handed over the letters, “Good.”

They passed each other their pleasantries, said their fair wells, and Marya was lead him out of the door to see him off when a servant stopped them, “Countess Hélène Bezukhova is in the front hall.”

Pierre did not know what it was that compelled him to follow Marya out of the room, slipping the bundled letters into his pocket, and down the hall. He had not seen Hélène in many days, had not received any news of the manor, of her, or Anatole. It spoke more volumes than anything else.

She did not wish to see him.

She did not, would not, could not forgive him for his actions. His stuff dumped in the snow only solidified that believe. But he followed, his feet would allow him no other direction.

Hélène was standing with her back to their entrance, staring out the glass in the door. She did not acknowledge them in any other way than tense shoulders.

Pierre’s eyes swept over her backside, over the silk and lace of her black dress, the decorative shawl wrapped around her shoulders that he recognized as the one of their mother’s that Anatole traveled to Moscow with, and her hair. There was a curl loose of its hold, something that Hélène would never allow.

Something was wrong.

“What is it, child,” Marya asked, her voice the stern lecture that she used with Sonya and the children at the market. “I was not expecting visitors.”

“I was not either,” Hélène spoke, her eyes trained on the falling snow passed the glass. “I am returning the favor, I could say. It is snowing.”

“I’m aware.”

“You took the last of the rosemary from the market place,” She said plainly, “I wish to borrow some if you do not mind.”

“You traveled all the way here for that?” Pierre found himself asking and Hélène turned so quickly on her feet that it surprised him she did not fall.

She glared at him through red-stained eye, “What are _you_ doing here?”

“He is my guest.”

“You would allow this - this fool into your house?”

“I allowed _you_ into my house,” Marya replied bitingly. “At least, for now. Is the rosemary the only reason you came?”

Hélène nodded once and then something like a tick jutted her jaw, she twirled back onto her feet to falling snow out the window, “Anatole loved the snow.”

“Hélène,” Pierre tried but stopped, _loved_. “Hélène, what has happened?”

She turned back around and stared directly into Pierre’s eyes as she spoke to Marya, “There is nothing of my brother you have to worry about any longer.”

There was something that rung of truth in it because Marya froze and observed the Countess as well. Pierre felt a cold dread in his gut, “Hélène.”

Her eyes grew colder, harder, and then something snapped and they were blinking and wet. Her voice stayed steady when she spoke again but soft, “Anatole has passed.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> DUN DUN DUN.  
> That ending probably would have been so great if this all didn't happen in between the scenes of the first chapter of I Pity You, I Pity Me. So you know, obviously, Helene is up to something.
> 
> The next chapter should backtrack a little to the lead up to Helene showing up at Marya's. Though, it will likely not come in as timely a manner as this one.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I said I was going to backtrack a little from the last chapter, I didn't actually mean all the way to the beginning but here we are. So yeah, we're back to the beginning to just after Hélène kicks Pierre out in ch1 of I Pity You and Dolokhov shows up. 
> 
> Sorry, it took so long to get out.

Dolokhov did not allow himself tears.

He had arrived with a lightness to his step that war had nearly scrapped from him, a tale on his tongue, and money in his pockets. A bag hiked up onto his shoulders and all the determination in the world to drag Anatole from the city, and it all fell to pieces in the doorway of the manor.

He had listened numbly as Hélène explained the blood on her dress and her tear-stricken face, listened as she assured him that it was not _she_ who had been hurt, that something horrible had happened. He had allowed her his hand and followed her closely up the stairs and down the hall. He had watched the rise and fall of Anatole’s chest until he trusted himself enough to look away, felt the steady rumble of Hélène’s soft spoke words as she hushed him and petted his hair.

He had watched, and listened, and felt nothing even as he cleaned the blood from under the fingernails of Anatole’s limp hands but he did not cry.

The numbness had given away in hours to his true nature and Dolokhov had thrown things in his anger. He had paced in his anxiety, he demanded and scared the poor doctor that he insisted he speak to. He drank, snapping and cursing Pierre Bezukhov’s name. He swore on the things he held dear and he promised a blood vengeance, that he’d stick his gun between Pierre’s ribs and pull the trigger. _I swear, Hélène, I swear it. Don’t try to stop me._

And Hélène, she let him have his anger and have her own as well, she was so exhausted and stressed. She said nothing to his words, his rants, the way he broke furniture whose only fault was being close to him. But she stopped him with his gun pulled from his holster and she held his trembling fist.

 _Stay_ , she had asked of him, _stay, I cannot be alone._

Anger was an unsustainable fire. It burnt and flared, and it either destroyed the outside world or it destroyed your soul. When there was nothing to add to the flames but empty silence and the steady wheeze of Anatole’s breath, the fire would fade. It’d give away to something awful, something too sad for words, too hopeless, to frightening.

Fedya Dolokhov was a stubborn grudgeful man and he’d fan his own flames until he could burn the life from Pierre’s body and mind. He’d do what he needed to keep the flame alight, to keep the cold helplessness from touching him, but he would do more for the ones he loved so he had sat his gun down. He had stayed.

Hélène had instead on that first morning when Dolokhov still believed that they’d see Anatole’s blue eyes before nightfall, that they speak to him like he was there. He had spat at the suggestion, refused it wholeheartedly. He wanted no part in making this more real than it already was but silence was oppressive and suffocating, and somewhere along the way, he realized that the constant buzz of his life was Anatole. Anatole’s voice, Anatole’s energy, Anatole’s trouble and his life so intertwined with his own.

He missed it. So damn much, he missed it.

So, he gave in. He spoke.

When the fire in his veins dimmed down to a worrying numb winter feel, he spoke. He drank, and he spoke, and he told war stories that he hated from battles he barely survived. He drank, and he got drunk, and he begged in a voice so close to cracking. He got drunk, and he drank more, and he cursed Anatole’s twitching hands and his sharp bones, and he accused him of not waking up for the attention.

“You always do this to me,” He hissed to the prone figure when Hélène slipped from the room, jabbing his dinner fork into Anatole’s thigh. He pressed harder and watched for movement, discomfort, anything. He expected Anatole’s whine of pain, he longed for it and got nothing in response, “You do this to me all the time, you make things so difficult.”

“Stop making things difficult, Kuragin,” He demanded of the figure, throwing the fork to the floor in his anger. “Wake up, Anatole. You’re hurting – Come on, Anatole…please?”

Dolokhov indulged in a lot of things, some he should and some he never should have, but he did not allow himself to cry. Crying was for funeral, battle injuries, and the dead. Anatole was not _that_.

The days lulled into each other and they spent most of them in Anatole’s bedroom, taking up space in chairs and along the foot of the bed, cluttering his desk and tables with books, and papers, and a game of checkers never finished. Neither were willing to leave for long, just waiting and dreading, and waiting.

Mostly, they sat in silence. Sometimes they were discussed things when vodka loosened their lips or the silence stretched suffocatingly across the room. They’d talk of most ordinary things, of the weather, and war, and gossip. They’d talk of Anatole when the mood was lighter and hope was there. Often, they’d snoop.

It took nearly an hour to pick the lock on the chest at the end of the bed when they were both too drunk to find the key. Hélène was that strange giddiness that the good side of tipsy made her, strangely delicate as she carefully lifted the stacked letter boxes and sat them on the floor between them, “Anatole will hate us for this.”

“Anatole is incapable of hate,” Dolokhov found himself replying, her giddiness infectious to his drunk heart. Be it the alcohol or the invasion of privacy, it did not hurt to speak of Anatole like it had been the day before. “But I would allow him his hate and to shoot me dead for it as long as he was awake.”

She hummed in something like agreement but her eyes were too focused on removing the ribbons holding the boxes together. The first one she opened contained old love letters scented with stale perfume and tacky with painted kisses on envelop covers.

They laughed.

For the first time in so many days, they laughed. It was a broken and terrible thing but it was laughter as Hélène mocked voices of love sick girls and Dolokhov guessed Anatole’s replies (or recounted tales of Anatole’s puppy sick adoration for whatever girl caught his eye as _he_ wrote the responses).

Another box held sheet music by the pages and scribbled out bars and scales on the backs of other people’s work, held old invitations to recitals that he had performed throughout his childhood and teens. Another contained the letters of Hélène and Dolokhov, friends of war and peaceful times, and a lengthy correspondence between himself and Pierre. There was even a letter written in their mother’s handwriting that Hélène had sat aside carefully and did not open.

The fourth of the boxes held trinkets. It was junk in Dolokhov’s opinion, just ribbons and scarves, cheap jewelry, and odd little buttons that all held meaning and stories of adventures and dear lovers. Anatole always remembered them, every single one of them.

It was that box that contained the flower, a red carnation. Wilted and pressed between the blank pages of a book with other flowers but this one was newest. It was Natasha’s.

Dolokhov crushed it in his fist before he realized it. Hélène looked curiously at him from behind an old journal, and then at the flower. “It is best he has as little reminders of her as possible. I have never seen him as heartbroken as he was after the failed elopement.”

“He was crying in the troika, he didn’t think I noticed,” Dolokhov said, letting the petals fall to the floor. “Find her letters.”

“Pierre has those.”

“Why?”

“That was what the – the incident was about, Fedya. The letters.”

“Don’t call it an incident, Hélène,” He sighed, it was the first time they actually put a name to it and it was the _wrong_ name. “Incident makes it sound as if he spilt his drink. It was assault.”

“That is an ugly word.”

“It was an ugly act,” He told her and then shifted to peer into the chest, he pulled a bundle of cloth from it. “What is this?”

Hélène felt the fabric and then took it from him, unfolding it and then smiling something sweet and young at the stitched pattern across it, “It is a shawl, Dolokhov. It was our mothers, I cannot believe that Anatole brought it from Petersburg.”

She wrapped it around her shoulders in a graceless motion and got to her feet. He watched from the floor as she moved a fallen hair off Anatole’s forehead and then pressed a kiss there, “I wish that he would wake up.”

“As do I.”

“I fear I will never know rest again until he does,” She said, staring to the window as the sun crept over the horizon on another sleepless night. It looked to be the pale kind of yellow rays that stole the chill from winter morning. “I am very tired.”

He felt it in his bones as it wore in her weaker moment on her face, “I too, Countess.”

It had been Hélène’s declaration over breakfast that they care for Anatole’s appearance as he would wish they would and since little could be denied of her in these moments, Dolokhov conceded without fight. He asked how he could help.

Anatole was bathed in a proper bath after days of sponges and bowls of water. Dolokhov had warmed the water himself, having sent the servant away and lowered his unconscious friend gently into the tub. He gathered the fragrances Anatole enjoyed and made work of washing the days of grime and dried blood from his skin. He took great precaution of washing the grease from his hair without wetting the stitches.

He made jokes at Anatole’s expense and imagined the outraged huffs and snappy comments he’d get in return. He mocked and amused himself with recounting the other times he had the joy and audacity to dump the stubborn prince into a bath. They had been for fevers then, and sometimes because Dolokhov was drunk and Anatole was drunker. His voice echoed mockingly back to him in the bathing chamber and Anatole said not a word.

Hélène stripped the bed of their soiled sheets, opened the window to the crisp cold air, and she had the servants take away the accumulated mess of leftover food, sticky cups of drinks forgotten, and the empty vodka bottles. She stacked the boxes as they were in the chest and discards the petals from the floor into the trash. She even managed to scrounge up vanilla scented candles and rid the room of the stench of body, sickness, and starved-off death.

Hélène inquired about the dark splotch of bruises blackening Anatole’s thigh as they wrestled his lank limps into nightclothes, and Dolokhov had shrugged. He mumbled something noncommittal and put his focus into easing Anatole into new sheets.

It was a new day, Hélène had insisted as she draped furs over Anatole’s bare feet and tucked their mother’s shawl across his chest. It was a better day.

He would wake today, she told him. And Dolokhov, a part of him wanted to believe it.

He opened his mouth to tell her that he hoped she was right but instead asked, “Dr. Kuznetsov is coming tomorrow, right?”

“Yes,” She sighed, fretting with Anatole’s damp hair. “I told him that if my dear brother does not wake before then that I…will consider feeding tubes.”

”Hélène.”

“It matters not, he will wake.”

“Hélène.”

She sent him an annoyed look but Dolokhov had always been pessimistic in spite of what he longed so desperately for, “Let us have this fight tomorrow, Fedya. Today is a better day, let me have it.”

He conceded in the moment, sending a pointed look down to Anatole’s slack face because she liked when he was acknowledged in these moments, before dropping down into his usual chair. Hélène huffed but said nothing as she picked a book at random from the growing stack on the table and started to read out loud from the middle.

Dolokhov had almost been able to let Hélène’s voice carry him into a sleep, slumped over onto his folded arms on the edge of the bed but a startling thwack against his ear pulled him from sleep’s clutches at the last second. His chair skidded backwards as he jumped up, glaring at Hélène and ready to curse her for a childish act but the words tripped on tongue because she was looking upon him with confusion and curiosity.

It was when Dolokhov allowed his eyes to slip from hers that his hammering heart in his chest skidded and skipped beat after beat before falling into his gut. He followed the outstretched pale hand from the edge of the bed up a pale arm to blue eyes owlishly look at him. It felt as if the air had vanished from his lungs and his knees went weak for that breathless second, “Anatole?”

Hélène’s eyes cut a vicious line across the room and she gasped but the three of them were all frozen in their moments. Dolokhov with his locked knees and open jaw, Hélène with a book slipping from her fingers, and Anatole.

Anatole, whose chin was pressed into his collarbone as if his head was too heavy to move, just watching with listless hooded eyes between them. Hélène found her voice and it was a pray unnatural on her lips, “My god, brother.”

Anatole’s eyes shifted slowly around the room as if he was drugged, like they were cataloging but it was staring without seeing. They seemed to slide off to the side of anything he was looking at. His hands seemed to shake more as he pulled his outstretched limp back to his chest, and he looked so…dead, corpse-like and exhausted in a way that sleeping hadn’t made him.

But it didn’t matter much because he was awake, “Thank god.”

Dolokhov grabbed his hand in his own and felt the bones and muscles shift beneath clammy skin, felt the pulse racing, “Anatole, are you with us?”

Anatole opened his mouth to speak but nothing more than a raspy wheeze of nonsensical sound came of it. They all looked confused for a moment, Dolokhov meeting Hélène’s eyes over Anatole’s head before saying carefully, “Take your time, Anatole. You are disoriented.”

He pulled breath between his teeth, squeezing Dolokhov’s hand weakly and tried again. And then again, and again, and panic set heavy in Anatole’s breath and his face as he muttered disjointed syllables, “Wh – I – ‘ff.”

Hélène shushed him, petting his hair and his face, and cooing in a way that slumped Anatole against her chest. She went through soft motions of easing the tension from his shoulders and his back as she repeated words of no meaning and then made demands of Dolokhov, “Water, get water, Fedya. It has been days since he’s had a drink, he is parched.”

Her voice held an awed kind of terror to it and it was absolutely astonishing to hear but Dolokhov did not pay it any mind as he maneuvered himself to grab the pitcher of water from breakfast that morning. He hazardously filled a glass and pass it to her before stacking pillows up to help Anatole stay upright.

Anatole did not take a liking to Dolokhov manhandling him back into the pillows, pressing back against him with weak jabs as his head lulled. Hélène comforted him with a shush and a kiss to his sharp cheek as he was situated, “Brother, calm yourself.”

If he had complied out of exhaustion or trust, it was not known but he had stopped fussing and allowed Hélène to wrap his hands around the glass and to keep her hands around his as she guided it to his lips.

She smiled at his first tentative sip and allowed him to greedily tip the glass higher until the water was gone. He protested the empty glass with a whine and Hélène slipped from the bed to refill it when Dolokhov stopped her, “Don’t. He can’t have more than that right now.”

Anatole let out another raspy whine and Hélène went on about her business because she believed that in all matters that came to Anatole, she knew best but she didn’t. Not in this case, Dolokhov tried to reason with her and Anatole’s shaky outstretched hands, “Anatole, you shouldn’t be drinking this fast-“

He took a step back because no sooner than Anatole downed the refilled glass, he retched the water upon the new sheets in a horrid wheeze. Dolokhov sighed, catching Anatole by the shoulder before he fell into it, “That is my point.”

“The doctor,” He said to Hélène. “We are not medical professionals, we don’t know what needs to be done next.”

She nodded but sighed, “It is Sunday, Dolokhov, he will be at church and it is a lengthy journey.”

He countered, ripping the top sheet from the bed as his anxiety turned to frustration, “Write a letter and have a servant deliver it to his door. I will clean this mess.”

Anatole made a noise of protest when Hélène wrenched open the drawers of his desk but his voice was such a rasping of worrying wheezing and pained cried that it was lost in the clatter. And soon, he gave in to Dolokhov’s insistence that he lay back into the bed and his eyes lost their battle to remain open.

“Eye.”

It was the first hint that maybe Anatole was not as asleep as they thought him to be, spoken lowly long after silence settled back over the room and a letter was on its way to the doctor’s door. His eyes were not open to see the concern look Hélène shot to Dolokhov as she stopped in her pace to repeat the word slowly, “I?”

“Eye,” He repeated, blinking his eyes open slowly and then nodding once. Even that action made Dolokhov’s limbs feel heavy with the exhaustion Anatole must be feeling.

Anatole opened his mouth, muttering something that didn’t sound like anything before seeming to understand that by the look on their faces because he repeated more instant, “ _Eye_.”

Hélène made her way to the bed and squeezed his hand, “I don’t understand.”

“Eye, c _an_ ’t-tk…” He raised free hand to gesture to his face only to nearly jab his eye out. “Eye.”

“What…” She trailed off, getting a good look into her brother’s tired eyes, at the pupil too large in comparison to the other and the unfocused gaze set to it. She breathed shuttering before clamping down on her emotions with a frown, ‘Your _eye_. You can’t – can’t see out of it?”

He nodded once, his body slacking at being understood and eyes sliding closed once more. Hélène didn’t have it in her to try to keep him awake as her eyes filled with tears. She kept voice a dull even tone as she patted Anatole’s hand before placing it into Dolokhov’s, “Anatole, I – I’ll be a moment. Dolokhov is here, don’t be frightened.”

And then fledge the room.

Hélène returned with the doctor and Anatole did not take kindly to being shaken awake by unfamiliar hands. Too big to be Hélène’s, too soft to be Dolokhov’s but not large or soft enough to be Pierre’s. He tried to pull his shoulder away and bury beneath the soft fabric of the shawl but the shaking was insistent and Hélène’s voice flouted into his consciousness, “Brother, open your eyes. You know Dr. Kuznetsov.”

Anatole didn’t actually but he opened his eyes anyways to get the hand off his shoulder and recognized the familiar face, “P’rre?”

Hélène’s smile fell but Anatole didn’t notice, “Yes, Pierre’s friend. He is going to check on you, okay? Do not be difficult.”  

He hummed, his eyes sliding back shut before Dolokhov jabbed his finger into the side of Anatole’s neck and got an indignant squawk in response. He’d always been ticklish, Dolokhov took some comfort in that remaining the same, “Listen.”

“These are just checks,” The doctor began, saying in a voice that was the same forced lightness that they were all adapting. It was as if it was the tightrope keeping them from falling into despair. “Just boxes to check off in these cases, you know. I was a medic in the war for a while so nothing you say will cause harm to my ears.”

Anatole didn’t respond, his eyes flickering around the room like he couldn’t be bothered to even listen. Dolokhov had seen the look before when high ranking officials were peacocking or giving dressing-downs. Anatole was uncomfortable and wished to be removed from the situation.

“You could swear, if you wish,” The doctor offered him as he unraveled the bandages around Anatole’s head to redress the wound with extra gauze. He did not speak again until he finished, “I am a man of god but I believe that even he would allow it just this once.”

Anatole hummed as a sign of acknowledgement and tried to lay back down but three hands reached for him, all stopping short with exception of Hélène’s, “Brother, Dr. Kuznetsov has to do the tests, you must participate.”

“It is easy in the beginning,” Kuznetsov told him. “It is just questions, all you have to do is answer honestly.”

He waited for a response and took Anatole slumping farther into the bed as one because he then asked, “Can you tell me your name?”

“An-tole.”

“That’s good,” He nodded, making a note in his pad. He asked of the date and where Anatole was, the town and the manor. He knew the latter, not the former. He knew the emperor and that there was a war going on. The doctor pointed to Hélène and asked who she was and Anatole answered, “’Lene.”

Hélène smiled at her brother, taking his trembling hand and unfolding it from the fist he’d curled it into to hide the shaking. The doctor pointed to Dolokhov and Anatole struggled not with recognition but name, “Dol’kff, no, d-dol’k – fen’da..fed-“

Dolokhov smiled something watery and clasped Anatole’s slender shoulder, “Aye, close enough. Next question, doc.”

“How did you sustain your injuries, Anatole?”

Anatole frowned, his brow pulling together in thought and then after far too long, “I – I don’t know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't get to why Helene decided to tell Marya and Pierre that Anatole was dead but I will! There was a lot of backtracking because I thought it was important to expand on Dolokhov's relationship with both Anatole and Helene since he is one of the more emotionally-charged characters in I Pity You (also just my fav to write). 
> 
> It was just getting too long to get back to where the last chapter ended so the next couple chapters are going to lead us back there (hopefully).
> 
> Cool Things: because this chapter was a major pain in the ass to write, I've accumulated a ton of a writing that will most likely make up the next couple chapters so there is that. Don't major in accounting, you'll get no time to do anything.


	6. Chapter 6

The worst of it was that Anatole was trying.

Anatole listened intently as the doctor explained in simple words the multiple tests of coordination that he wanted to preform and he attempted every test with a concentration and a seriousness that was usually so foreign to him. And he failed time and time again to do things as simple as touching his finger to the doctor’s, as rapidly flipping his hands over his lap, as walking in a straight line. Failed to remember, failed to speak coherently. Failed to hide the despair on his face.

The worst of it was not the way Hélène’s smiling face looked more and more like cheap paint on a wooden mask or the way she fretted and fidgeted like a nervous child. It wasn’t the burn behind Dolokhov’s eyes or the cold winter feel in his gut. The worst was how damn hard Anatole was trying and now little it meant.

It was not unusual, the doctor had them, assured them, assured nobody.

It was not uncommon for people with these kinds of injuries to experience memory loss, to come away with some kind of…physical affliction, mental ones.

Anatole was still healing, he assured the set of hard eyes glaring over the blond prince’s head. Some conditions may go with time as injuries improved and some would be adapted to.

He’d already come so far, Kuznetsov offered almost awkwardly, who is to say that he will not go farther? The matters of the mind have always been mysterious.

Anatole wasn’t listening to the doctor, Dolokhov could tell just by watching as the prince glared unseeingly into the middle distance with an eye that did not focus anymore. He wasn’t listening either, not really, letting words like nerve damage, and permanent, and ‘there is nothing more I can do’ wash over him in numbing waves. He’d been to war and he’d never felt a helplessness as miserable as this.

It had been a beautiful glorious moment when Anatole woke up. A moment that stole the breath from Dolokhov’s lungs, stole the beat in his heart and all the hope he did not know he still held. For that moment, he allowed himself to believe that everything was perfect, everything would be okay and then it was all stripped away.

It took only a second to fracture the fragile denial Dolokhov had built up over the dark and gloomy days, it was a fool’s delusion to think that nothing terrible would come out of Anatole’s unconsciousness. It was stupid and fractured with every question asked, every struggled answer, every simple test that Anatole failed to do. It all fractured to pieces.

Anatole woke up and everything was wrong. And broken. And it fell to ruin before his eyes.

“Thix m-me.”

Anatole’s eyes flickered from the floor to the faces around him, glaring as hard as glassy fatigue would allow him. There was something unsettling in the uneven gaze, something desperate in the voice, and no one would meet his eyes.

“Th-thix me,” Anatole demanded once more in the stiff silence that grew only thicker. He growled frustrated when no one responded to him, no one would look at him, and made a grab for the glass he’d drank from earlier to throw it but his clumsy hands just knocked it over. He cried out upset and frustrated and pulled at his hair with fisted hands.

Hélène pulled his hands from his hair patiently and with great care to not cause him pain, and then held them to her chest. She said nothing of the twitching beneath them, met Anatole’s gaze straight on as she unfolded the fists and intertwined their fingers, “Hush, Anatole, hush.”

Anatole pressed his face into her shoulder to avoid the eye contact he wanted so badly and spoke in a voice that nearly cracked the dam in Hélène’s eyes, “B’kn, I – me.”

Dolokhov kept his eyes trained on the doctor, watching critically as he shifted uncomfortably under the gaze. He ignored Hélène’s kiss to Anatole’s temple, ignored the way her voice sounded flat so not to give away how little she was holding it together, “Like always, Anatole, you are wrong and I am right. Believe me when I tell you that you could never be, dear brother.”

“I am to speak with the doctor,” She told him gently, like speaking to a scared child. Dolokhov supposed that was what Anatole was. “Rest, brother. I will return soon enough.”

He nodded tiredly, not fighting against Hélène’s soft hands as they maneuvered him back into the pillows and pulled the blankets up his chest. She wrapped the shawl around him once more and Anatole buried his face in it.

She offered him another soft kiss and smile as his eyes drifted shut. Once his eyes were no longer on her, she dropped her smile into a wobbling lip before she pressed them together in a thin line. Dolokhov saw her wipe at her eyes before she made it to the door.

He stood as well, making to follow the doctor out when there was a sudden grasp onto his hand. He met Anatole’s eyes and the question that hung in them so demanding that it felt as if it took presence in the room. Dolokhov offered him an upturned lip and a pat on the hand as he placed back onto the bed, “Yeah, Anatole, you passed all the test. You did good.”

Anatole accepted Dolokhov’s answer because Dolokhov had never proven to be deceitful. Society may had thought he was mean, a bully, but Anatole appreciated the honesty even when it did not favor his flights of fancy.

Dolokhov ignored the guilt that settled in his gut as he continued to the door. Hélène was asking the same echoing questions that she had rephrased multiple times during the tests, as unsatisfied with the same answers now as she was then, “How does he not know? It is hard to forget, yes?”

She didn't accept that sometimes trauma was too big, that it was forgotten from the mind to save the soul, “Would it really be better if he remembered?”

“Yes,” Hélène snapped at Dolokhov’s soft question. “Yes, it would because – because he _has_ to know. Careless, my brother is, but forgetfulness is not one of his virtues. He – how could he not know?”

“It is the head wound, Hélène,” Dolokhov spoke over the doctor’s voice. “I have seen soldiers with limps removed in aid-camps that cannot keep it in their minds that they are not whole even after being told multiple times.”

“That’s different.”

“How so?”

“Because – because I am not losing my brother to a war!” She snapped. “That is justly, this is – this is _cruel_. He is uncomplete now, missing a part of his mind and his – make him remember!”

The doctor shifted uncomfortably again before saying  _again_ , “It is not unusual to lose the memory of a trauma, Countess. Some would say it is a blessing.”

“It is not blessing, it is a curse,” She hissed. “ _Fix_ him. It is all he wants, give it to him.”

She sounded nearly as desperate as she had on that first night, holding her brother and covered in blood. She sounded incredibly and awfully young, “ _Please_.”

There was something tired and old that crept into the doctor’s response as he reminded Hélène that Anatole waking at all was miracle in itself and she knew what he thought of miracles. He told her to be happy, she had a living breathing brother and not a corpse, and then he told them that he must take his leave.

His words quieted her in a way that Dolokhov had never seen before and the doctor’s tone shifted to a lighter one as he gave notes about diets, and sleep, and all the many signs of getting worse to watch for.

Hélène thanked the doctor after there was nothing more to offer and she stated in a fragile voice that Dolokhov would show him to the door before disappearing down the hall.

He wasn’t all that surprised that Hélène was not in Anatole’s room after he saw the doctor out just slightly disappointed about it. He found her in her brother’s study, glaring out a window unseeingly as she fiddled with a crumbled draft of a love letter. She did not greet him.

“Hélène,” He stressed her name. “ _Hélène_.”

“I can’t – just – go away, Dolokhov,” She said, her back to him because Hélène was many awful things and prideful might have been the worst of them. She hated weakness without opportunity, she gained nothing by showing her emotions to him. “I cannot handle all of this and _you_ right now.”

“Well, when are you going to handle it?” He asked, already hearing the creaking of the breaks in his voice and the pressure burning behind his eyes. His mind kept replaying those tests and the way Anatole missed things that should have been so easy. He couldn’t say his name. He couldn’t-

Fedya pressed his lips together and looked away despite Hélène not looking at him. He kept his voice measured but it took effort, “Anatole is your brother.”

“I know that.”

“This is already hard enough on him without you abandoning him.”

She shot him a deadly look and he met it. She sneered, “Do not play Prince Charming, Fedya. It does not suit you.”

“Aye, but the wicked witch is suiting you perfectly,” He hissed back. “Go speak to your brother, explain the things he does not understand.”

“He does not speak.”

“But he listens, and he is scared, and you are his _sister_ ,” He told her, stressed to her. “Comfort him. He needs it now more than ever.”

“I told Marya that I’d take him to Petersburg when his strength was up,” Hélène stated, scrubbing at her face with the palms of her hands. She began to pace, fussing around the study and tidying up Anatole’s messes. “I said – I can’t take him back to that castle now, Fedya, I cannot take him anywhere.”

“Hélène, I-“

“Papa – he would understand,” She told him with despair, losing her energy and collapsing onto the couch. “He would be so embarrassed of his – his _golden_ son. All those lessons, and – no one would understand.”

“Prince Vasili’s _stupid_ son,” She sneered. “Petersburg beautiful menace, the pretty careless prince. The – the _troublesome_ son, broken and – and defected with no words and – and limping like a _fawn_. He would be mocked, he would be an outcast, a _joke_.”

“It would ruin him,” She breathed out, her voice shuttering but her eyes stayed dry and hard. “I have to make sure that no one knows. No one can know, Dolokhov.”

“That, Countess, is not a problem for today,” He told her, striding across the room and grabbing her hands. He pulled her up into his embrace as he shoved his emotions below the training of a military officer. He needed to keep his head, she needed it of him. “Listen to me, Hélène.”

“Be happy, Hélène, Anatole is awake,” He breathed, taking her face gently into his rough hands and swiping his thumbs across her cheeks as if to wipe away the tears that were not there, “Be relieved today, be grateful, Hélène. You do not have to save this family from its ruin, not today.”

“Your duty is to your brother,” He told her. “And right now, he just needs you to be his sister, not his savior.”

“I can’t fix him, I don’t know how.”

“He’s not broken,” Dolokhov stated and he meant the words with his entire soul and body. “He is Anatole and he always will be, and we both know that that _child_ will fret and makes matters worse if we are not there.”

She nodded slowly with his words. She was listening, _good_.

“We must return to him, are you okay?”

“No,” She answered honestly. “No, I am not but – but I will have to be for Anatole’s sake. Please take me back to my brother, Dolokhov. We will leave these problems for tomorrow.”

He smiled, taking her hand in his own, “If the matter counts, Countess, you were right. Anatole woke today.”

That got a smile from her and then a snorted laugh that she buried into the side of his neck. She pressed a kiss to the heated skin there and then pressed one to his lips, “I do not know what it was that Anatole did to befriend you, Fedya, but I am grateful for it.”

“Dolokhov, the assassin,” She stated in almost a mock as she pulled away and then tugged on his hand so he followed. “Dolokhov, the kind-hearted. Moscow’s greatest secret.”

He laughed, allowed himself to be pulled from the study to Anatole’s room. Anatole was curled on his side, shawl slipping from his shoulder and pillow crushed between his chest and knees.

Dolokhov dropped into his chair and Hélène crawled into the bed, wrapping her arms around Anatole’s waist and curled around him. She rested her chin against his shoulder and sighed, “Fedya, there is room in the bed for you.”

“I am sure that there is,” He nodded, slouching down until he was comfortable. “But I am content where I am.”

She snuggled closer to her brother and accepted his answer for what it was, stubborn nobility, “If he wakes in the night and it does not wake me, please do.”

“Of course, Hélène, sleep well.”

“Have sweet dreams, Dolokhov,” She told him. “You deserve them.”

For a moment, in that moment, Dolokhov allowed himself to loosen his muscles with the relief of seeing his friend’s eyes again. They were different, he was different, but Anatole was stubbornly Anatole and Dolokhov would acclimate to any version of him.

He met Hélène’s eyes over Anatole’s shoulder and hoped the smile he gave her was as convincing as his words, and he did not allow himself the tears threatening him as she closed her eyes.

Anatole slept through the night. The only difference between now and before was the restlessness that plagued him. Anatole had never been too sound a sleeper, never been still. Dolokhov had once found it annoying when they were exhausted soldier sharing tents but he minded it very little when he was woken at sunlight to a foot pressed into his good shoulder.

What he did mind was the emptiness in the bed.

Anatole had shifted in the night, laying horizontally across the bed with one leg drawn to his chest and the other extended off the side, the blankets tangled around him. He was sole occupant of the bed. Hélène was gone.

Dolokhov stood, easing the knots from his back and shoulders before searching the manor for the countess and finding nothing. He had asked of the servants he came across and they had all offered apologies for not having answers.

He felt something like irritation gather within him and sent one of the servants to sit with Anatole until he woke up. He found a bottle of something good and cracked it open, settling in at the bottom of the stairs and waited for Hélène to return.

 

 

“W-What?”

The word left Pierre’s lips like a hiss of steam from a scalding tea kettle and Hélène felt herself flinch at it, at all the memories that Pierre’s stupid face assaulted her with. She could still visualize, still taste the panic in the air, was still haunted by the twisted anger in his face, the heaving breath, and his hulking form over Anatole’s slender one. She remembered too much blood pouring out of her brother, her cries, the blood that stained the underside of her fingernails.

She shuddered and found herself struggling to find the right mask for this moment as she spoke, “Anatole didn’t survive the night. It is – it is unfortunate.”

“Darling-“

“I thought you should know,” She stated, meeting Marya’s eyes dead on. She ignored Pierre and the stupid sad way his face was crumbling. She ignored all the emotions bubbling under her skin and warning that they were too close to the surface. “It was a – it was a concern of your last we spoke. You need not be concerned any longer.”

“Hélène.”

She ignored him, “If you – if you could just, the rosemary. Please.”

“Hélène.”

Pierre took a step towards her, his arms outstretched like he thought to comfort her but Hélène stepped back, backing into the doorframe in her retreat. He dropped his lumbering arms to his side, shaking his hands of their nervous energy and tried, “Hél-“

“ _Stop_ talking, Pierre,” She told him, her voice was hard but wavering and her eyes gleamed coldly from behind a wall of unshed tears. “Do not talk to _me_ , do not comfort _me._ It is Marya that needs it oh so greatly, she looks troubled.”

She did not look troubled, Hélène noted as eyes flickered between the two of them but Pierre was stupid, and dumb, and he saw only what he wanted to see in the faces of people. He had once saw her own beautiful, her clever wit, and her pretty singing voice and married her without a thought of her crueler natures.

Her words did as she wished because Pierre moved his anxious brown eyes off her and to the dame. Marya looked cold and impersonal the way stone statues often did but it was with surprise not trauma, not sadness. She looked frozen, Hélène would take satisfaction where she could get it and she’d take it here.

Marya was an observer, a watcher of gossip, a listener. She did not participate in the drama just watched it unfold in front of her like it was part of life’s grand opera. Hélène was more than willing to give her a show, “You care not for me, Pierre, and even less for my brother.”

Pierre, on the other hand, _did_ look stricken, looked ill and like his eyes would fill with tears at any second. She saw that look briefly on Dolokhov’s face before falling into an awful nightmarish sleep and she hated it. She hated it, Pierre had no right to feel such a sorrow when was the cause of it, when he ruined her brother, ruined –

He caused it all, he – Hélène’s wrist was caught before her hand connected with its target. Caught in a hand much bigger than her own, much strong and more gentle than she would have been, and it let go when she wretched her arm away.

Hélène had been startled by it, having not thought to move to hit him though she long desired to cause him a pain as stabbing at the one inside of her. She heaved a breath of anger, and frustration, and fallen tears.

The was part of the act, she told herself. It had to be.

Her mouth twisted into an ugly frown and her eyes dropped heavy tears from off her eyelashes, and she cried. She cried and she swung hard with an open palm and Pierre did nothing as she connected a resounding slap to his cheek. She swung again, and she screamed, and she cursed him for taking her brother away from her, her Anatole. Her perfect, perfect Anatole.

“I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”

Marya, always the silent observer, the gossip queen with her disapproval and snide words. She was the one that pulled Hélène away, having taken all she was willing to take of the fight Pierre was not putting up. She trapped Hélène’s flying limbs to her side and pressed on them almost painfully, telling her in a voice that barred no argument, “That is enough. It is enough, now.”

Hélène tried to pull away, her hands curled in fist but Marya was not having it. She shook the younger Countess and she demanded of her, “Gather your wits, Kuragina, gather your wits and leave this nonsense at the door. This is not the way of my house and you will respect my rules.”

“M-Marya?”

Marya’s eyes snapped like a hawk to the top of the stairs and she hissed a curse beneath her breath at the concern falling in waves from it, “Soyna, where is Natasha?”

“She is – she is sleeping,” Soyna answered, her hands gathered nervously along her jaw as she took in the events below her. “Is she – what has happened?”

“A marital spat, it is nothing that concerns you, my child, now go,” Marya demanded of her. “Go to Natasha’s room and close the door. Go now.”

Marya was demanding, strict but kind, and she always knew best so Soyna reluctantly listened. She disappeared down the hall before Marya turned back to Hélène’s struggling to pull away, “You are making a fool of yourself.”

Hélène ripped her arm from Marya’s almost painful grip, stumbled after stepping on the end of her dress and found her back pressed against the cold glass of the door. She sobbed, jabbing an accusing finger at Pierre and demanded of him, “Hit me, hit me like you hit him. I’m cruel and I am awful, and I-“

“I will not hit you, Hélène. I could never-“

“You used to be better,” She snapped, scrubbing at her irrational tears and her heaving shoulders as sobs racked her frame. “You used to be better, you _were_ better but I – was it I that ruined you so much that you do this to me?”

“Hélène,” He sighed that sad little gasp of breath that should not come from a man his size. It was like he was taking pity on her, he reached for her again in a desire to comfort a fallen woman but dropped his arms.

“You are nice to everybody,” She accused him, spitting the words like they were bloody and acid. “You are nice to everybody, too nice, but you – you _hurt_ him. You broke him, you – you did not have to.”

“I am so-“

“ _Don’t_!” She snapped. “Don’t apologize, your apologies mean nothing and I will not take them. I want my brother, I want-“

Hélène felt her knees go wear the ways that high emotions caused her to feel faint, felt the shutter and the shake of them and Pierre rushed forward but it was Marya’s unnaturally gentle hands that led her to a seat on the tiled floor. She sighed something motherly and tender, and petted over Hélène’s messy curls, “Oh, child.”

Whatever delusion that Hélène held on to that this was all her decision, that every action she had taken was of her own accord and not dictated by human emotion. The tears were just an act, she wanted to believe but it all fell away to the reality of what was happening, of all the feelings that she didn’t allow herself to express the day before.

Marya believed her because there was nothing graceful that could come from this, nothing grand, no act this raw.

Hélène couldn’t stop the tears, couldn’t stop the awful sobbed words and the near-pleading for her brother back because – because Anatole was different now. Anatole wad changed she didn’t like it. She _hated_ it, she wanted her brother in all his ridiculous carefree eccentricities. She wanted, “It is your fault, you did this to me.”

Pierre sunk to the floor sometime between Hélène ruining the fabric of Marya’s dress with salt-tears and mascara by burying her wet face into it and Marya taking to awkwardly stroke up and down Hélène’s back in a way that not comforting or assuring. When Hélène’s tears retreated into sniffling and she attempted to pull her mask together, Marya hushed her and told her to stay put.

“No, no, shoo, I cannot leave you on the floor,” She changed her mind, ushering Hélène to her feet and lead her through the halls to the drawing room. She sat her in front of the fire and draped a blanket over her shoulders, telling her to dry her eyes before she disappeared from the room. Hélène did as she was told, trying to calm her breathing and starve off the heat of embarrassment growing within her, trying to figure out how this spun out of her well-planned hands.

Because it had not been a plan, her mind supplied her. It was an act of spontaneity, impulsive the way Anatole was with his whims instead of the true nature of her practical, manipulative self. She had come for rosemary, had been compelled to get it, but Pierre had ruined it and she wanted to ruin him.

She thought to herself that she should leave, that she could disappear into the snow back to her manor and her broken brother, and she slumped into the chair in an unladylike fashion.

A throat cleared in the doorway and Hélène resisted a groan, “No.”

“Hélène, my wife-“ She tsked loudly, shooting him a look that he’d only be so lucky to be killed by, and Pierre backtracked, “I mean, I – Countess? May I sit down?”

“No.”

He sat down anyways, taking up too much space in a chair a small distance away, pressing his hands to the fire before folding them awkwardly in his lap, “I don’t know what to say.”

“Then don’t say anything, Pierre,” She told him. “There is nothing to say and your words hold no meaning to me. You knew what I held dear and you took it from me.”

“I was not – I was not thinking of you when I committed the act,” He tried to justify, tried to – failed to. “I was not thinking. I had no intention of-“

“I do not care of your intentions just of the results. If you had something of as much value as Anatole is to me, I would break it.”

He nodded, leaning back into his chair in a slump before leaning forward again with elbows on his knees, “I have never seen this expression on you, Hélène, it is most unsettling.”

“No one has ever ruined my life before, Pierre, we are all experiencing new things today.”

“Can you – can you tell me how it happened?” He asked. “If it isn’t too much, that is. I know that it is still fresh.”

“Anatole woke up,” She told him truthfully. “He woke up and I was happy but it was not Anatole, it was a shell. When those eyes closed again, I knew that I had lost my brother.”

“He is all I have loved,” She stated, not so much to Pierre as to her and the fire. She looked cold and lost, exhausted and miserably young as her eyes filled with tears once more. “He is – I watched his first steps, his first words, the first time he picked up a violin. I was – I was the logic to his whimsy, he was the heart to my mind, and I – I am not whole when he is not.”

There was something very awful about strong figures crumbling, something awful about a lost child in a crowd marketplace and the longing in the eyes of widows of war. But there nothing that was quite as awful to Pierre as watching as somebody as prideful and strong as Hélène cried silent tears in the fire light. His heart ached for his wife, he pitied her poor soul for what it felt.

He reached out without thing and to his surprise, she allowed him to take her trembling hand. She asked in a small voice, “What is it that Marya is doing?”

“I don’t know,” He answered. “I – Hélène, do you have somebody to stay with you?”

“Dolokhov is there.”

It ached in Pierre’s heart at the mention of the man and he bit down on his irritation and jealousy at it because, at least, it was somebody. He asked next, “Surely he is as distressed as you are and I know you do not wish to see me but would you-“

“No,” She snapped, pulling her hand as if he’d suddenly burnt her and wrapped it around herself. “I do not wish to see you in those halls again, Pierre. Do not return to the manor.”

He sighed, leaning back but conceded with her request, “As you wish. I am truly sorry for what I caused you.”

“It won’t bring him back to me.”

“I know.”

“It does not make me feel better,” She told him. “My world has been cold without my brother, now it is – it is, I don’t know. The days before me are mysterious and I do not like it.”

He nodded and Hélène accepted that before turning over her shoulder to the doorway, “Do wish to join the conversation, Marya, or to just listen in? Surely, you have been entertained enough by our antics.”

“Antics is not what that was,” Marya chided, finally stepping into the room with a tray of tea and pastries. She sat it on the small table between them and then took a seat on the arm of Hélène’s chair, “Are you calm?”

“I am empty,” Hélène answered, feeling the drain she often felt after being so honest. “I have no sorrow left in me and the anger has bled from my skin.”

She nodded, pushing a cup of warm tea within Hélène’s hands, “Would you like me to write to your father?”

“No,” Hélène answered stiffly. “No, I have written to him already, as to Ippolit. I do not wish for people to know.”

“Hélène,” Pierre said, surprised by the statement.

“I want him to be remembered as he was,” She told them and she meant it. “I want him to remain that exasperating prince, the slippery scoundrel that always got away. I want him to remain the stories he has become, I do not wish to cause any of his lovers the pain I am feeling and I don’t want him to be reduced to – to _that_ moment.”

“That is understandable but-“

“There is not but, Pierre, it is my wish and it will be fulfilled,” She snapped, voice going harsh before evening out. “You do not gossip, it will be easy for you, and Marya had already given me her word, yes?”

Marya hesitated but nodded, “That is right.”

“Not even Natasha,” She stated. “She would blame herself, you know she would, Marya.”

Marya nodded again, actually agreeing with that this time and she made fuss of tidying the blanket around Hélène’s shoulders, “You are welcomed to take your time as needed, Countess, and I brought with me a bag of rosemary as you requested. I am – your loss is unfortunate.”  

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, uh, Helene is taking everything very well? 
> 
> There is more to come of Helene's questionable life choices as she struggles to find the right things to do to help Anatole.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is basically just how many italicized words I can put in something before somebody tells me to stop. 
> 
> I really shouldn't spent as much time as I have finishing them and not doing the tons of homework I have but here we are. Hope you enjoy.

“We no longer have to worry about Marya,” was Hélène’s greeting through the door hours after Dolokhov gave up on his search. “I have handled everything.”

He did not return the joyous smile she graced him with nor comment on the enervation that sat in her eyes. He said nothing of her drained energy or the tale-tell signs of past-shed tears. He said nothing as she shed her coat and her mother’s shawl, nor did he offer her anything else.

He took a long swig of the vodka bottle he’d worked halfway through and leaned back onto the stairs uncomfortably, following her with lazy eyes as she observed him. She rolled her eyes and gestured to him, “What is this?”

He said nothing. He drank more.

Hélène rolled her eyes and waved him off before pitching her voice low into an irritating whine as if to imitate him, “How did you manage this amazing feat, Hélène? Well, Dolokhov, you will find that I did it with my wit and charm, thank you for asking. Oh wow, Hélène, you are as clever as you are beautiful, a goddess among us mere mortal men. Thank you, Fedya, you are too kind. How was-“

“That is enough,” He snapped, sitting the bottle down audibly on the step next to him and standing up. He swayed with the alcohol for a moment before steadying. “Where have you been? You did not tell anybody that you were leaving.”

“How is Anatole?” She asked instead of answering. “He was still asleep when I set out this morning.”

“Did you leave to speak with Marya?” It was no longer a question but a demanded and Hélène found it not to her liking. “Hélène, what did you tell Marya?”

“I am not answering anything put to me in that tone, Dolokhov.”

He took a deep breath and then breathed out, clenching and unclenching his fist as he went, “You spoke to Marya, obviously.”

“Yes, obviously,” She rolled her eyes. “I went to the marketplace, Fedya, for the preparations of Anatole’s favorite meal. I wish to have it made today.”

“You went to the marketplace,” He recounted, an irritated slur to his words. “And you spoke to Marya, yes? You’re being difficult on purpose.”

“Marya got the last of the rosemary, I visited and she gave some to me,” She told him, thrusting her bag into his arms as if to prove her point. “It was a long journey, that is where I have been.”

“Your eyes are red.”

“The wind is a terrible thing,” She replied. “I walked a great distance in it.”

He squinted at her and cross his arms around the bag, he would accept her answer but he would not believe it. She knew by the set of his jaw but she cared little regardless.

“I will have the cooks prepare this for dinner and everything will be lovely,” She added, taking the bag back from him. “That is, if you lose whatever attitude you have drank yourself into. I am in no mood for it.”

“ _What_ was it that you spoke to Marya about?”

“I told her that Anatole is not a problem that she has to fret over any longer,” She finally answered. “I said that he passed so she has no reason to return here and-“

“What?”

“He clearly has not, don’t be so-“

“This is a joke,” He stated, rubbing his hand through his already messy hair. He refused to believe his ears. “This is a jest, you have to be joking.”

“I could not allow her to see him this way, he is – is _damaged_. It is wrong, he isn’t Anatole, he is – he is the – the defected calf that you look at with pity and hope that the farmer has the sense to take out of its misery.”

He sounded horrified, “Hélène.”

“She would turn him into a joke, the same way we laugh at Old Prince Bolkonsky’s madness or Denisov’s speech,” She waved off. “It is a scandal that he would not return from and I love my brother far too much for that.”

“Anatole couldn’t go out into Moscow anyways,” She added as reason. “It is of no consequence if she thinks that he no longer walks among us and it gets her out of my hair. It lessens my burden, my stress. Follow me to the kitchen, yes?”

“He might not return from _this_ , Hélène,” He snapped, stomping after her graceful steps. “That man, your brother. Like it or not, what he is now might be as good as it gets.”

“And I will accept that,” She rounded on him in the kitchen doorway, jabbing her finger into his chest hard enough that he took a step back. “I love him, he is my brother. You can think you know what is best for him, _Dolokhov the assassin,_ but you don’t. I will love him no matter what he is but he is _shallow_ , and what those – those gossips and idiots think is of importance to him. I am saving his face.”

“By killing him?”

“It was not my intention,” She admitted, her anger falling back into a kind of aloofness. “I just wanted the ingredients but Pierre had been there visiting the Rostova girl, no doubt. I just got – I was angry, irrational. I wanted to hurt him the way he hurt me so I did.”

“By _killing_ your brother.”

“Only figuratively,” She shrugged as if it was a little white lie. “I fed the guilt that was eating Pierre.”

“You know, Anatole is aware that something is going on with you,” He stated. “He will think that you hate him if you continue your behavior.”

“Anatole knows better than that.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Dolokhov sighed, feeling drunk and exhausted all at one. He ran his hand down his tired face before addressing her, “You have to tell Pierre the truth, it isn’t right.”

“No, I really don’t,” She replied, anything left in her voice went hard and icy, and it held that streak of Kuragin stubbornness that drove him mad. “I cannot kill the man myself so I will assist him in hanging himself on his own guilt. It is just.”

“It is cruelness for the sake of being cruel.”

“What are you doing here anyways?” She asked, waving a hand in a gesture around them. “Who is with Anatole?”

“Well, if you were here-“

“Do _not_ treat me like I am a horrid person because I am looking out for him.”

“Then I will use one of the many other reasons.”

“Ha! Dolokhov the _jester_ , I see,” She deadpanned. “You are not funny.”

“And you are looking out for him in the _wrong_ ways, Countess,” He snapped at her jab. “Look at your choices, Hélène, look at what you are doing, _hear_ what you have said. You told Pierre and Marya that he died.”

“Marya is a gossip and Pierre, he will tell all his secrets if drunk enough,” He tried to reason to her. “It could get around to – to anybody, it could bring people to this door. It could carry to Petersburg and your father, how would he take that?”

“Better than he would the news that his son is an invalid.”

He gritted his teeth, “Stop it, Hélène.”

“It is the truth, is it not, Dolokhov?” She snapped at him. “The world will treat him as one, he cannot string together thought or sentence. Eyes will look at him and not see his handsome face or his charm only his – his inabilities, his brokenness.”

She sneered her next words in Dolokhov’s face, baiting him for a fight that she longed to have, that _he_ longed to have, “I am not _you_ , drunk before noon. I will not pretend that this is okay.”

“You – you think I am _pretending_?” He asked incredulous, his voice a pitch above hysterical, too snippy, and snarling, and disbelieving to back down now. “I am not pretending, Hélène, I am realistic. I have seen worse than you can imagine, I have walked through med-camps and battlefields, I have smelt death on my friends. I _know_ horrible things and Anatole is not that.”

“He is different, he will stay different,” He snapped, grabbing her by the shoulders with a rough shake as he pressed her almost painfully into the doorframe. “You are being a stupid ridiculous girl and you are above it, Hélène. You are above it, see reason! He is not broken, not an invalid, not anything less than he had been before just different now.”

His voice was softer as he held her, almost a pleading if they were not both too proud for, “He is just different, now, Hélène.”

She shoved him, slamming the heel of her hand into the wound on his shoulder and shoving him in his blinding pain. He stumbled and tripped over his feet, landing on the floor with a thud. He hissed a curse that was venomous but not directed at her but the pain. The action had surprised them both.

Hélène’s surprise quickly morphed into anger, underlining with gratification at the ease she befell a decorated officer. She kicked the bottom of his boot to have his attention, “I will not allow you to make me feel guilty because I am not as accepting of ruinous things as you are. I will not feel guilty for wanting my brother back.

“He is not gone,” Dolokhov told her as he climbed back to his feet, his voice was still hard but laced with pain. “He is upstairs in his bed and when I roused him this morning for drink and vitamins, he spoke in clearer words. He asked for you, his _sister_. You do not get to pretend that he is not here because you do not like what you see.”

“This is my house, I will do as I please,” She snapped and then turned onto her heels and demanded that someone bring the damn cook to her. She offered Dolokhov one last withering glare and told him in a harsh cold voice, “I will not ask you to leave because you are a dear friend of my Anatole’s.”

He felt the coldness in his veins, felt it melt against the angry flames in his gut and he gritted his teeth as he spoke, “I appreciate that, Countess Bezukhova.”

Her jaw set into an ugly sneer at the use of her married name, it twisted her face into something like a horrible painting and she bit back a snarl as she spoke, “I will tell you to hold your tongue next time you wish to raise your voice at me, Fyodor. Your relationship with my brother may mean plenty to you and means little to me.”

“If you are in a pleasant mood than you may join us for dinner this evening,” She stated as she stalked off to speak with the cook. “If otherwise, I do not wish to see your face again.”

Dolokhov waited for her to disappear into her conversation, pointedly ignoring him so to have the last word. He swallowed down the frustration gathered in his throat and curled his hands into his fists so tight that his fingernails cut into his palms.

He turned on his feet and stomped loudly back down the hall to his vodka on the stair. It felt like an act of defiance drinking from it so he drank, and drank, and drank until the liquor burnt the back of his throat and brought tears to his eyes.

He heaved out a frustrated growl and adjusted his grip on the bottle’s neck and then launched it over his head. He barked a laugh at the sound of it shattering against the wall on the landing a quarter of the way from the top of the stairs.

Dolokhov thought bitterly about just disappearing, walking through the front door and never returning to a manor so cold and empty. He thought of the dreams he’d have, of the relief it would be to not have to be stoic and strong. He thought of his mother and all of her words of comfort, he thought of her love and all the time he’d spent away from her.

A part of him – the devilish vindictive part of his soul – would take pleasure in watching Hélène fall apart, would take pride in seeing her in pieces. He slammed the lid shut on those thoughts and sighed, taking the stairs two at a time.

Regardless of Hélène and how frustratingly wrong was she was, regardless of how much she was hurting and wanted the world to hurt with her, he would not leave. His duty was not to her, it was to Anatole and he would not be so quick to abandon it.

He slowed at the top of the stairs and then stopped, feeling the blood drain from his face and his knees nearly go out from under him, “What – what are you doing out here?”

He’d startled at the sight of Anatole, not in his bed where he was supposed to be but sitting against the wall at the top of the stairs. Dolokhov’s eyes played a vicious trick on him, conjured images of pooled blood and dead eyes instead of what it was. Anatole did not appear to be injured in anyway, it was as if he had grown tired and decided to rest.

“You are meant to be resting in bed, Anatole,” He told him. “The wooden floors cannot be comfortable, right?”

He was slouching in the way Anatole never did, his feet pressed flat against the opposite wall. His tired unfocused eyes met Dolokhov’s for only the briefest second before looking away, he wiped at them with a clumsy hand and then just shrugged.

Dolokhov felt something freeze inside of his gut, “How long have you been resting here?”

He got nothing in return so he pressed farther, “Anatole, did you hear any of that?”

“No,” Anatole’s voice was a shaky high whisper and his shoulders crumbled in on himself. A silent sob wracked his frame but he flinched when Dolokhov reached out for him.

Fedya sighed, sending a quick prayer to whatever deity that was listening that Hélène saw reason before he goes crazy. He let his hand drop to his side and then sat cross-legged across from Anatole at a distance, “How much did you hear?

“Nuff.”

He sighed again, feeling old and painfully sober now. He longed for his smashed vodka bottle. “She didn’t mean it.”

Anatole drew his knees to his chest and buried his head in them, he said nothing. It had been nearly impossible to coax more than one worded answers from him since it became apparent that the broken speech wasn’t going away with sleep.

“You know how she is,” Dolokhov tried but got only shaking shoulders in return. He felt a hopelessness overcome him and crack his heart because nothing should be like this, least of all Anatole. “You’re recovering from injury, of course it is going to be difficult at first. There is nothing wrong with you, Anatole.”

“Yesth,” He said into his knees.” “There ‘s.”

He even managed to lift his head for a glare but it cracked into more tears the moment he met Fedya’s pitying gaze, “I – I – I…”

He cried out frustrated but it broke into a sob, a loud echoing one that mocked them in the empty hall. Anatole pressed his lips together but the dam had been broken and the tears were flowing, he could not stop the next sob to break or the one after that.

Dolokhov was hesitant when he put his hand on Anatole’s shaking shoulder and then was nearly knocked backwards when Anatole threw himself into his arms, clinging to him. His collar grew damp with tears as Anatole buried his face into it, wrapping uncoordinated limps around him and holding on as if Dolokhov could let him go.

He wrapped his arms around Anatole’s shaking frame as well, running his hands up and down his back in a motion that was soothing to them both.

Tears he could deal with, he thought as he pressed his own face into Anatole’s shoulder and tried to keep his at bay, tears he could understand. He could deal with the inevitable anger, with rage, and injustice, and helplessness…he could force himself to confront a great deal but he was at a loss when all Anatole’s eyes held was lifelessness.

He could not accept the thought that cut vicious lines through his minds that maybe Hélène was right, perhaps Anatole was an uninhabitable shell of who he had been. Perhaps his friend was gone forever, but this. He could offer comforting hands and a shoulder to cry on.

He pressed a kiss into Anatole’s hair, just above his ear and below the bandages, and he whispered stupid words with no real meaning – _everything will by alright, Anatole. Trust me, Anatole. She didn’t mean it, those words are not hers. I am here, I will never let anything happen to you. I am here_. He let him curl into his lap, let him sob syllables. He let him cry.

It was when the crying turn to sobbing turned to violent wheezing, into heaving, into rasping gasps of breath, and Anatole scrambled backwards so violently that his back hit painfully against the opposite wall. His red eyes were puffy with tears and wide with panic as he pressed a flat hand to his chest.

“Goddamn it,” Dolokhov swore as he tried to take Anatole by the shoulder only for the man to shift out of his grasp and push himself farther away. He tried again with the same result before holding his hands up. “Anatole, you’re hyperventilating. You need to calm yourself.”

He got a head shake in return, and tears, and Anatole’s fingernails clawing at his throat. His voice was shaking and just barely understandable when he gasped, “H-he’p!”

“I’m trying,” Dolokhov muttered, managing to get a hold of Anatole’s tunic. He pulled his forward but Anatole was all clumsy limps and panicked movements, and he pulled against the hold until his shirt choked him. “Listen! Listen to me, I know it feels impossible but you have to-“

Dolokhov broke off into a hiss as felt, for the second time in some many minutes, a jab to his sore shoulder and the pain that radiated from the spot blossomed through his arm and his chest. He curled the limp into his chest as vision blacked for a moment, it gave Anatole the opportunity to scramble backwards.

“Anatole-“ Dolokhov hissed as he rushed forward but his hands caught nothing because Anatole’s own hands landed on air as the floor dropped off into the first step. He cursed, trying to grab him but Anatole was already falling to the landing with a painful grunt.

He hit the wooden floorboards with an audible gasp, catching it with his elbow and shoulder taking the brunt of the fall. He cried out in pain as he struggled into a seat positon, gasping as his hands slipped in the vodka and glass. His breathing was still a horrid wheeze heaving through his lips as he leaned against the wall with his bleeding hands cradled to his chest.

Dolokhov rushed to his feet and down the stairs. He crouched in front of Anatole, ignoring the weak fight Anatole put up as he grabbed the bloody hands and observed the glass imbedded in the skin, “It is a flesh wound, Anatole, it’s just the flesh. You are okay – you are-“

He let Anatole pull his hands away from him but only so he could push the prince’s chin up until they were eye to eye, “Listen, Anatole, you have to answer me honestly. Did you hit your head?”

Anatole pulled away, sobbing words with no hope of them making any sense. There was a lot of them though so Dolokhov figured that he was trying to answer so he asked the question again, asking for a nod or headshake.

Anatole shook his head no and then shrugged his shoulder like he was not quite sure.

“Hurt,” Anatole wheezed, holding his hands out to Dolokhov with palms out to show him the vodka stinging cuts. He whimpered when Dolokhov took them carefully and pulled a large shard from the palm. “Knee.”

There was blood seeping through Anatole’s trousers, Dolokhov had already catalogued it with the other scraps and scratching, and he’d get to them. There were more pressing issues, “You’re going to faint, Anatole.”

Anatole’s eyes went wide so Dolokhov continued, “You’re hyperventilating, it is going to make you feel lightheaded and then you will faint if you do not get control over your mind.”

He sniffled and tried, he tried to stop the tears and his rapid shallow breathing. He tried but Hélène and her words filled his thoughts, _damaged, wrong, defected_ , and he found the tears to cry more. He rasped, “P-plea _s_ e.”

“Anatole?”

The voice was a breathless whisper but it rung loudly over Anatole’s wheezing and Dolokhov’s lowly curses, and the footsteps that followed were hurried. Hélène was there with her hypnotically smooth voice and her soft hands, and they offered no comfort to her brother in his state.

She crouched into the vodka beside her brother, cooing and rubbing his shoulders and his back in a way that always calmed him but Anatole sobbed ever more, “An – brother, it is me. What is wrong? What is he doing out here?”

“He heard you,” Dolokhov spat the words in a hiss between his teeth. “Fix it, Hélène. You wish to fix everything than fix this. He has worked himself into a state of panic.”

His tone was mocking and his movements deliberate when he shooed her out of his way. When she did not move, he shoved her over so that he could take Anatole’s face into his own so that his eyes were all he saw, “I need you to focus, Anatole, I know that is not your strong suit.”

That got a scoff from somewhere behind him and Hélène muttered under her breath about the insult but Dolokhov paid her no mind. He took Anatole’s hand and pressed on one the cuts until Anatole’s eyes shot to his, “Good, you’re paying attention.”

“Fedya!” Hélène’s voice was a shriek and he waved her off without a thought as he stopped pressing against the wound. He did not let go of his hand. “You are hurting him!”

“Hold your breath,” He commanded Anatole and when he didn’t comply, he pressed onto the wound again. “That is order, Kuragin. Hold your breath.”

Anatole listened and Dolokhov was pleased by it as he counted the seconds in his head, “Breathe out.”

He repeated the command over and over until Anatole’s breathing was calmer and he was slumping to the side with the exertion from getting out of bed and then from the panic attack.

“Anatole,” Hélène’s voice was a soft but it offered little comfort. She petted his hair but he moved his head out of her touch. “Listen to me when I speak to you, Anatole, are you listening?”

He did not respond immediately so Dolokhov did, “You’re going back to your room, Anatole. Here, let me help you.”

“No,” Hélène cut off, slapping his hand away. “No, Anatole, you have to understand. We will have better days, brother, they are upon us now.”

“We will bring you to bed and fix your hands, and you will sleep,” She told him. “Tomorrow, it will be better.”

“Do you – do you understand?” She asked, her face cracking when he flinched from the hand she laid onto his shoulder. “Brother?”

“Now is not the time,” Dolokhov snapped at her, shoving his arms under Anatole’s armpits and pulling his to his unsteady feet. He was too tall to be carried or Dolokhov would have because Anatole’s legs were barely able to hold his weight. “Take his other side and help me get to his room.”

“I have to get the doctor for his-“

“I can mend his hands,” Dolokhov snapped and then demanded of her, “take his other side, Hélène.”

She listened this time and the two of them practically dragged him back to his room. They dropped him over to the bed and Hélène went off to grab better bandages while Dolokhov made quick work of removing the shards of glass from his hands and arm.

Hélène spoke when Dolokhov was wrapping Anatole’s damaged hands, “How did this happen?”

“He experienced panic and fell from the top stair.”

“You did not catch him?”

Dolokhov shot her a hateful glare as he left Anatole to remove his bloody shirt and spat the words with sarcasm and mockery, “No, Hélène, I let him fall and did nothing.”

“You did not just _accept_ it?” She scoffed, as she started to help Anatole with the shirt he was struggling with. “You are very good at accepting things that happen.”

“Do _not_ ,” Dolokhov warned her. His voice was not a grumble of frustration nor a shout, it was that cold demand of a soldier. It was the assassin in him and Hélène seemed to realize that.

Anatole sighed between them, shirtless and thin. He sniffled and rubbed at his eyes, “St _ah_ p.”

Their eyes both snapped to him and Anatole glared between them, “S-Stop, l-leaf – lea _ve_ , go.”

She had opened her mouth to respond and Dolokhov had snapped his shut but Anatole did not care for either of them in that moment and pushed himself farther onto the bed with his hurt hands. He pulled the blanket over his bare shoulders and turned his back to them both.

Hélène sighed, closing her eyes for one brief moment of weakness before she picked a fallen fur from the floor and draped it over her brother. She pressed a kiss to Anatole’s temple before sighing once more, “I will tell the cooks to postpone dinner until tomorrow.”

And with no response forthcoming, she took her leave. Dolokhov stayed behind, solid and frozen to the spot. He was unable to move, unwilling to, and then he did. He walked to the other side of the bed and dropped into his usual chair.

Anatole’s cracked open one eye and gave him a withering look to which Dolokhov returned with a tired one, “If you wish to get rid of me then try but I have seen you try, _princess_ , it is most embarrassing. My sister is better at it.”

Anatole huffed and rolled over, only to find it uncomfortable and turn back around. He glared at Fedya as he resettled into the blankets before holding out his hand expectantly.

Dolokhov laughed and took the pale hand in his own.

A part of him marveled the ways of Anatole’s affection, the subtleness when he had no ulterior motive and the open childishness of it, and he smiled to Anatole’s closed eyes. He smiled as his friend absentmindedly stoked the rough pads of his fingertips calmingly over his skin before he started to drift off.

Dolokhov watched, just watching the way Anatole’s face fell slack and his body go boneless. He watched the way he turned in his restlessness and never let go of his hand, the way his face twitched with something like a dream, like a nightmare. He stared at the black eyelashes brushing against pale skin, the open mouth drooling wetting the pillow beneath his head, the rise and fall of his chest and the restlessness of his legs.

He watched and felt overcome by how grateful he was for Anatole waking, grateful that was just sleeping – that this was just sleeping and not something so much worse.

And Dolokhov felt a shudder run through him, felt a wet heat burn his face, and he felt himself crumble under the weight. Burying his face into his hands, he allowed himself what he had denied for so long. He cried.


	8. Chapter 8

Dolokhov woke from a nap that he hadn’t planned to take to a throbbing ache in his shoulder and fingers carding through his hair in an almost gentle manner, feeling exhausted the way tears often made him. It was a soothing motion that nearly lured him back to sleep if not for a fingernail scrapping painfully against his ear.

It incited an involuntary hiss from him and pulled him effectively out of his sleepy daze, the fingers paused before continuing. When Dolokhov found it in him to lift his heavy head, he met tired blue eyes and an oddly disarming smile as Anatole observed him.

Dolokhov found himself filling in the blanks between them, “Hey, sleep well?”

Anatole shrugged, his eyes watching him in an open critical way like he was some kind of puzzle that he hadn’t quite figured out yet. Dolokhov cracked his neck and rolled the stiffness from his shoulders uncomfortably under the gaze before he shooed the laxed hand away from his head, “Well, I didn’t Move over.”

Anatole shifted over in the bed and Dolokhov kicked off his boots before climbing into the sleep-warm blankets next to him. He embraced the soft sheets that smelt of the soap they were washed in and a little of Anatole.

He sighed in the warmth and the softness after days of sleeping little to none in an overstuffed chair but neither of them tried to find sleep again.

It was a comfortable silence that befell them but there was little comfort to be had. As sleep receded and their minds were left clearer, the comfort fell to the uneasy rustle of shifting blankets and fidgeting hands.

Anatole shifted first, struggling to find comfort in the blankets and then struggling to find the words he wished to say.

Dolokhov watched from the corner of his eyes as Anatole opened his mouth to speak and then promptly closed it with a frustrated expression, watched the ways he made small gestures with his hands as if he was if he was rehearsing in his head before throwing his hands in the air and giving up. He would sigh, then shift uncomfortably. He would fidget with the blankets, with his bandages, with his hair.

“Anatole.”

“Won’t s-stop.”

Dolokhov was not excepting a response, his eyes shooting to his friend immediately to find him glaring at his trembling hands in his lap. He was clenching and unclenching his fist repeatedly. “What?”

“Make it stop,” He demanded slowly. “H-hands.”

“Anatole.”

“You can – do that, eh?”

“No,” Dolokhov answered and a part of him hated himself for it, hated Anatole for asking such an impossible task from him, hated Pierre. He channeled it all to the fires beneath his skin and his vow to end Pierre’s life. “I – it isn’t something that can simply be fixed.”

Anatole sighed, looking away first and then slumping into the blankets, “Kay.”

“An-“

“It ‘s – _is_ okay,” He stressed the words. “End of con – end of this.”

Dolokhov relented, trapping the words on his tongue behind clenched teeth and fell back against the pillows on his side. There was an apology worming its way into his consciousness and he knew, he _knew_ not to offer it. Apologies meant nothing when the problems were not a matter of hurt feelings or healing injuries.

Apologies meant nothing to a violinist with trembling hands.

Dolokhov’s heart ached for retribution.

Time passed unevenly, cut with a sigh from the prince or a fidget, or both. It was becoming increasingly irritating for the both of them so Dolokhov put an end to it. He prompted, “Do you want to talk about what happened?”

“No,” Anatole answered anticlimactically after time passed between them in dreaded anticipation. He picked absentmindedly at the bandages on his shaking hands. “No.”

“What is it that you want?” Dolokhov shifted onto his side despite the twinge in his shoulder. Anatole opened his mouth to speak but was cut off, “Other than me healing your hands.

He closed his mouth and refused to met Dolokhov’s watchful gaze. It was odd in an unsettling way to see Anatole stripped of his bravo and flair, “Do you want me to get Hélène?”

“No.”

“Then what is it?”

He swallowed, finally meeting Dolokhov’s gaze with hesitation in blue eyes, “I, uh, I…a dr-drink?”

Dolokhov paused for half a second and then resisted the urge to roll his eyes. There was no getting around Kuragin stubbornness. “Just a drink then, nothing more?”

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“N-yesth.”

“You have nothing to say.”

“I – no.”

Dolokhov sighed internally and then untangled himself from the bed’s warm clutches, he slid his boots back onto his feet before addressing Anatole, “I will retrieve you a drink.”

“Dol’kth.” The voice rose hesitantly when Dolokhov made it to the door, hand on the handle and the door pulled halfway open. He paused, turning to catch Anatole’s frown. “Thfff’ya. No. F’fed-na-ya.”

“Yeah?” Dolokhov answered lightly, keeping the sigh from his voice. Anatole struggled with a lot of words, it was not just his name but it was only his name that made it feel as if a dagger had been sunk into Dolokhov’s heart. “What is it?”

Anatole made a noise in the back of his throat that reminded Dolokhov so much of his mother’s ‘come now, child, or I will beat you with the first thing I find’ tut that he was almost positive Anatole adapted it from her. He gestured with a lazy hand to come back to the bed when he had his attention.

Dolokhov came, allowing himself to be pulled next to Anatole onto the bed. His eyes were drawn to Anatole’s unfocused one, it threw his face off balance in a way that was not entirely unpleasant just…different. He was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he was startled by the lips suddenly pressed against his.

Dolokhov had been too surprised to return the kiss because they didn’t do this. Not sober, at least.

Anatole was plagued with bouts of antsiness. Unrest and anxiety would fill his features and his actions, it kept sleep from him for days on end. There was too much energy in him and no club or bar, or woman to relieve it. It used to drive Dolokhov mad to wake up to his muttering and fingers tapping out beats known only in the head of a blond man.

He used to hum a lot, would scribble out strings of notes and key changes on the inner soles of his boots when they were too low on paper to spare it. It was an odd little thing to witness, to know, but charming in the way Anatole took great precaution not to be.

Anatole’s hand on his neck slipped to grip the back of his collar in a tight hold, curling into the fabric in a ruinous strong grip when Dolokhov reluctantly returned the kiss. Encouraged by the response, Anatole kissed harder, rougher, with an urgency and desperation that felt palatable in the room.

He was fueled only further by Dolokhov’s warm hands resting against bare flesh as he stead him so he did not slip from the bed as he leaned farther into the touch.

It was a trick, a trap…a test, Dolokhov acknowledged this thought almost absentmindedly in the back of his mind. They didn’t do this sober and kissing had never been the priority when they did, tension needed released and pretty girls were not always there. It was never anything more than that.

Anatole was a perfectionist, bred to be by a mother of particular quirks and oddities and a father obsessed with social image. Hélène had been right, Anatole _was_ shallow, self-possessed and small-minded and he did not know how to be anything more than that. All that was dear to him had been stripped away with his smooth-talking intoxicating bravo and he was – reacting.

That was all this was, a reaction to imperfection, to the fear of becoming imperfect. This was a test to see if he was still desirable, still beautiful.

It was all Anatole cared about, all he knew how to care about. And god, he was.

Nothing would change that.

Anatole’s hand at his jaw wandered, his hands always did. Jumping down the slopes and the ridges of Dolokhov’s spine like the keys on a piano, slipping under his shirt to bare skin. He played his lovers like beloved instruments, Dolokhov was no different.

His hand gripped hard onto his belt and Dolokhov broke the kiss regretfully, “Anatole, no.”

Anatole paused for one breathless second, face flushed and glassy eyes cracking into _something_ and then his lips were crashing into his. His nose bumped painfully into Dolokhov’s and pulled on his belt once more, pulling him closer as he tried to remove it.

Anatole pulled away frustrated when Dolokhov engulfed pale hands on his waist with his own calloused ones and pulled them away, falling back against the headboard with an audible thud. His lips were bruised, swollen and indigent, eyes dilated with want for more but bfrustrated all the same.

He crossed his arms over his bare chest, said nothing.

“Don’t do that to me,” Dolokhov told him, finding himself angry and frustrated. “You don’t get to be angry in _this_ situation, Anatole.”

“You want to be angry?” He asked, almost as a challenge as his own anger boiled over his frustration. “Be angry then, you have the right but you do _not_ get to be angry at me for this.”

Anatole made a scoffing sound in the back of his throat and turned away from Dolokhov, pulling on the blanket to cover his head but it was pulled away, “Stop being a child.”

“No!”

“Why are you doing this?” Dolokhov asked, keeping the blanket wrapped in his fist, he refused to drop it or this line of demanded questions. “You want to kiss me, fine. You want to do more than that, fine. But do not treat me like a – like some kind of consolation prize.”

“You’re like this now,” He stated bluntly and Anatole flinched at the words, the tone. “For better or worse, this is who you are, Anatole. Do you _understand_ , Anatole? That does not mean that you settle for me because there is nobody better for you to take.”

“You…” Anatole’s brows pulled together, he tilted his head the way confused dogs did and then he pressed a hand to his temple. “Not, no, Thed’da.”

He took a deep breath and spoke very slowly and almost clear, “You are m’ f-friend.”

“I know.”

“You do…not want me.”

Dolokhov did not say anything, observing the ways Anatole’s eyes were trained on him with a look of absolute despair. When he finally found the words that he wanted to say, he made sure Anatole understood the full extent of what he meant, “We both know that isn’t true.”

“I-“

“I’ll get that drink now,” Dolokhov spoke, standing form the bed and leaving the room without a look behind him.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thought that this chapter would be fluffy but nah. Instead of physical angst, I've brought to you some emotional baggage. Things are going to get slightly worse before they get better if things follow what I have in mind. Helene will be back in the next chapter.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promised Helene, I did not promise that it would be happy.

Hélène was in the hall.

Dolokhov pulled the door shut soundlessly and he ignored her. He ignored the way she leaned against the wall with her back pressed to it, the way she tapped her shoe but made no sound. He ignored the way her hands were clasped so tightly in front of her that her fingers had gone stark white, ignored the waves of emotion tumbling off her.

The waves crashed against the floor into an ocean of regret, and jealously, and cat-like curiosity, pooling around his ankles before receding behind her impassive mark of porcelain and paint, into a bored expression. There was no trace of shame to her.

She was incapable of the decency of shame. She had been listening and there no guilt or disgrace at having been caught.

Her mask cracked from its boredom to a raised eyebrow and a questioned inquisitiveness playing along the curl of her lips. Her eyes were stained with the red swell of tears shed, she had been watching through the crack in the door.

Dolokhov forced his groan inward and pressed his forehead to the cool wood of the door. He thought to pray for those better days that Hélène kept speaking of but thought better of it, more and more it felt as if there was no god looking out for assassins and scoundrels.

His jaw worked out of a painful clench but his voice was far too soft, “I am in no mood to be your source of amusement.”

“It is good that I am not in an amusing mood then,” She replied promptly, keeping her voice low to match his tone. There was something held in it that Dolokhov could not decipher, a kind of sadness foreign to her. “Take the red from your face, Dolokhov, I do not care of your preferences.”

He tried his best to sink into the wood and drown in it because Dolokhov was not Hélène and he did feel shame, a lot of it. She seemed to realize this because she added unhelpfully, “Anatole told me all about the two of you and your activities long ago. I don’t find it outrageous as the old dames of Moscow would, just…endearing.”

He flushed worse and allowed himself to groan, “That is not better.”

“It’s cute,” She mused, pushing herself from the wall and latching onto Dolokhov’s arm. She pulled him with her down the hall. “Anatole’s affection tires so easily and yet-“

“It is not affection that he feels for me, it is convenience,” Dolokhov stated bitterly. “I failed the hidden test.”

“Because you did not call him pretty and make love to him?” She asked with a snort. “He is frustrated but he will get over that. It is me that he hates.”

There was a beat of silence between them where Hélène waited expectantly for him to tell her just how wrong she was, how she did the right thing and it was Anatole who had his emotions twisted. She waited for him to tell her that it was not possible, that even the simplest thought of it was ridiculous but Dolokhov didn’t. He said nothing.

He scuffed the toe of his boot against the carpet and wished that her arm was not entangled in his own before frowning and licking his lips, “Well, there is that.”

The stifling of silence that fell after those words paused them in the narrow hallways in both disbelief and assuredness that she must have misheard him, but like all the things around them, it cracked.

Hélène’s mask splintered into a laugh, a huff of laughter so absurd in the kind of day that have had, and she slapped his arm affectionately. He found something in him that was able to join her, cracking laughter that broken farther into an incredulous hysterical snicker.

When it died back into silence and they continued walking, Dolokhov gave in and gave to Hélène what it was she wanted so deeply, “He does not hate you, I don’t believe that it is even possible for him to.”

“It is,” She insisted, her smile dipping back into an emotionless straight line. “He does. I can – he was _afraid_ of me on the stairs, I saw it in his eyes.”

He told her with only truth and honesty in his voice, “It wasn't you that he was afraid of, he is afraid of what he is.”

“And what is that?”

“Human,” Dolokhov said after a moment, searching his heart and his vocabulary for the words to explain it and finding only one, _human_.

Anatole was truly and deeply afraid of his own consciousness, afraid of the realization that he was not somehow above all the heartache and the trauma that accompanied living in the world, above the consequences.

It was a terrifying and sober realization that was settling in the prince for the very first time, just how touchable, and vulnerable, and _breakable_ he was. It was something that he could not run from, could not talk himself out of with smooth words and flirty tones, could not escape.

“He is afraid of being a person,” Dolokhov added as an afterthought. “Of being less than perfect.”

She nodded soberly and said nothing as they descended the servants’ stairs to the kitchen. When she did speak again, it was a justification of actions that were not hers to justify while Dolokhov found a glass in the cabinets. It was the same justification that she brought forth a hundred other times before, “You cannot blame him.”

“I can’t?” He asked. “I cannot blame him for trying to use me to his own ends when all that I have ever been was a friend that cares about him? Yes, I can.”

“Anatole is – is a _child_ , he does not know what it is that he wants,” She said. “He reacts with his heart, not his mind.”

“Anatole knows exactly what it is he wants at all times, that is how we have ended up here.”

“We make excuses for the older Bolkonsky,” She protested, defending Anatole’s side with her every breath despite knowing nothing about it. “We downturn our eyes when he falls asleep at the table, we never mind the cruel and _rude_ words he boasts so loudly at parties, the way he _flirts_.”

The word was said with disgust on her tongue and stone in her eyes, “Surely, if you can find it in your heart to forgive him for his glaring errors than you can find it in you to forgive Anatole in his confusion, he is-“

“He is _not_ an invalid, Hélène,” He stated. “He is not sick, not old, not _crazy_. He is Anatole and Anatole does what he wants with no regard for how I feel-“

Cracks shattered up the sides of the glass with the force in which Dolokhov slammed it to the table in his anger, the breaks fracturing beneath his grip but he did not pay it any mind. He breathed out slowly.

Hélène voice was the tender resolve that accompanied awakening from sleep, “You love him.”

“Don’t you?”

“With my whole heart,” She answered, watching him with the critical eyes she dissected the opera plots with. It felt as if she was weighing his worth, searching him to see if he held a value worthy of Anatole, and Dolokhov already knew that he didn’t.  “That is not the way I meant it and you know it. You _love him_.”

She sighed as if her conclusion was right, “You never said.”

“Why would say anything?” He sneered defensively, not denying her because there was no point when she already believed herself to be right. “It is not like he is capable of returning those feeling, it is not like it is _right_.”

“Anatole loves you, Fedya, he always has.”

“I am his friend.”

“ _Best_ friend,” She corrected. “There is a value and a worth to that title and don’t you dare demean it because of the bitterness in your heart.”

He rolled his eyes, “Anatole is not capable of love, he does not know what it is.”

“Anatole has lost the capacity for a great deal of things,” She stated coldly. “He is – is injured, broken beyond any repair of my own or that you could offer and we can’t _fix_ him.”

“You say that he is not broken,” She continued. “But he _is_. His head, and his heart, and his mind are all broken and because of that, you cannot hold him accountable for a kiss, Dolokhov.”

He did not need this, not her words or her flawed reasoning. He channeled the feeling of futility into the fires of anger, and then he channeled it all towards Pierre. He pushed it down and held it back and he refused himself the desire to let it burn until he could burn the rightful owner of all his misfortune.

He breathed a startling question, “Would you have rather that he died?”

There was no malice to the words, not spite or curiosity in his voice. There was nothing there but void, he just sounded empty.

Hélène was taken back, “No.”

“Would it not be better?” He asked, pressing her with his words more painful than any grip and with eyes like a wounded puppy. “If he died than you have your anger and you could direct to Pierre, you could ruin him in the public and the private, but Anatole is alive and you would not risk his reputation by airing out your grievances so you only blame yourself.”

“I am not at fault.”

“Why is that?” He asked. “You hate what is it that he has become but you were here with Anatole that night. He was with you in the drawing room and you allowed him to follow Pierre to that damned study. You heard the yelling and the screaming and the hit, after hit, after-“

“Stop it!” She snapped. “Stop it, stop this! This is cruelty.”   

“You did _nothing_ while it happened.”

“I put a stop to it.”

“It was too late.”

The words slapped her in a way that Dolokhov would never raise his hand, resounding in a room so silent and cold as Fedya released the glass and it fell to pieces on the wood of the table. It hurt, hurt in the reversal of the conversation she had with Marya. It hurt because she did not know the script, could not predict the ending, could not help her brother.

“And where were you?” She snapped defensively. “Where were you and your stupid war time oath? Where were you and your _insight_ , Dolokhov, your guns. He shot you, you should have known, yes? That is what you said.”

“Where were you?” She taunted. “You did _nothing_! You dropped him off here, heartbroken and nearly sick from it, so I would pick up the pieces and you could wipe your hands of the mess you helped make.”

“That is not the reason, I went to gather funds-“

“Pierre is bigger than I, stronger and angrier than I’d ever seen him,” She hissed. “He said awful dishonorable things to me that night. I was frightened of him. I _am_ frightened of him.”

“He is gentle,” She sneered, striding across the room in angry steps as she gathered a basket and a rag to pick up the broken glass glittering in the light from the windows. “He is gentle but not when is angry, and drunk, and he had threatened me once before. I thought he would hurt me then, I thought he would hurt me that night. He hates me, I know that, but I did not think that he could hate Anatole-“

“I did not tell Anatole to go,” She stated. “I did not tell him to stay and I will live with my regrets. I did not think – I never thought somebody was capable of such a horrible act.”

“Anatole is naïve,” She added quietly once the glass was disposed of and she had nothing else to fix. “He is – he is careless, he lives with his head in clouds and he does not see things through. He is ridiculous and he makes mistakes but he is – he has never been cruel of heart, Dolokhov, you know that.”

“I know.”

“I will die with these regrets in my heart,” She said in a voice so tired and loss, and young. “I do not need you to remind me of them.”

“I am not reminding you of them.”

“I didn’t know Pierre was capable of such an act,” She told him. “He had only even been kind to Anatole, patient with him even when he was frustrated. I thought – I didn’t know what I thought, it was wrong.”

“I know, Hélène.”

“He would have killed him that night.”

“I know.”

“I do not wish that my brother dead, I am trying to make it better.”

“I _know_.”

“Everything will be better when we have the dinner,” She settled, busying herself with finding a new glass and filling it with water. “It will be a better day.”

“There aren’t better days, Hélène, there is only today and today is – is _awful_.”

“Today is awful,” She repeated in agreement. “My brother hates me, I am married to an idiot, and you were right all along. Today is the most awful day since – since I walked into Pierre’s study.”

She sighed, her hands wrapped around the glass like it was the only think keeping her from falling to pieces, “Allow me to accompany you when you take this water to my brother, Fedya. I wish to explain myself.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More to come, it is just a matter of when it will come. 
> 
> No promises because I allow these characters to go wherever they want and Helene is the absolute worst at not following my original plots but Marya and Pierre might be coming up in the next few chapters. 
> 
> Thanks to everybody that has taken the time to leave kudos, and bookmark, and comment on this fic and everybody that has done the same for I Pity You, I Pity Me.


	10. Chapter 10

Dolokhov felt the heaviness of impending doom with every step taken in the in the direction of Anatole’s room felt it with all the anticipation and grandeur of approaching battle. He felt the itch to grab the gun that was not at his side but tucked away in a drawer in a dusty guest bedroom, felt painfully underdressed and painfully alert.

It felt as if his soul would not know the soft security of peace until this battle was had. Whatever battle that it might be.

If Hélène felt anything similar than it did not show on her face.

Her eyes stayed expressionless and razor-sharp with their focus as she stared transfixed on the glass of water in her hand. Her shoulders were back, her spine straight, and she did not waiver in her step.

Dolokhov trailed behind her and wondered if this was how she would walk into battle, if this was the kind of battlefield that Hélène navigated with ease and grace. Armed with wit and determination, and a heart clad in iron and steel, she was braver than him in this moment.

She stopped outside the door and took a deep breath and let it out slowly, letting her shoulders drop for only a second before straightening up. It was the only sign of nerves that she would allow be seen before pushing the door open.

Dolokhov watched from the side as her body went rigid and tense before dropping into something sad, “Oh, Anatole.”

He peered over her shoulder when he forced himself to look, expecting something awful, something terrible and bloody. What he saw was almost disappointing in comparison to his cruel mind.

Anatole had always been whip-thin, pale skin stretch over deceptively defined muscles and decorated in tailored clothes, but this was ridiculous, it was frightening to a degree. Every rib and ridge of his spine was visible under the tight stretch of translucent flesh, every heave of his breath noticeable from the doorway and painful to watch.

His muscles were twitching in the tension in which they were drawn across his shoulders and down his arms, and he was shaking with the exertion it took to remain standing and to keep the death-like grip on the bow in his hand.

He was staring, not at them.

He hadn’t even acknowledged them.

Anatole was standing in the room, staring and just staring at the violin that had been moved from the side of the bed to the top of his desk. His eyes fixed with a hypnotized glazy look at the instrument. He wasn’t blinking, wasn’t doing anything.

He hadn’t acknowledged them even as Hélène took a hesitant step forward, “Brother?”

Anatole had learned the piano to appease his father.

It was a tactic and a show put on for their constant company at their company parties to make his children look better, more desirable, perfect. Hélène and Anatole. He’d accompany her singing from behind the black and ivy keys, accompany her voice with the smooth velvet of his own.

He’d learned the cello because Ippolit had one and gave up on the instrument after a couple lessons, and because those lessons interfered with Anatole’s dreaded geography tutor’s schedule. He learned the harp in an evening to impress a girl he liked, could pluck a tune on Dolokhov’s old guitar after hearing it by ear but it was the violin in which he truly fell in love with.

Hélène would say sometimes with a roll of her eyes and a fond smile on her face, that Anatole picked up the violin because he could not bear the thought of the attention being on her. You couldn’t move from behind a piano but with a violin, you could dance around the room on soft feet and he did.

He always did.

Anatole was incapable of being still, too incapable to truly enjoy the cello or the piano, or even the harp, but the violin was freedom on music notes and pressed against his fingertips. He’d glide over the floor and across the cobblestones of the market place, he’d do the jigs that Fedya could match without missing a beat as they danced in the down-time during the war.

All of that was lost now.

Dolokhov felt an ache in his heart when Anatole finally looked to them because he realized it too.

“Anatole,” Hélène tried again, her voice a soft whisper as if she was afraid of breaking whatever this was but only Anatole turned his gaze back to the instrument. Concern crept into her voice as she crept into the room, the glass of water held to her chest. “Anatole, dear brother, please.”

Dolokhov stood in the doorway, watching. He did nothing but watch as if the events unfolding in front of him like the climax of the opera. It felt as the voices and the sequenced dances were all exceeding expectation but the room remained still and silent.

It was the conflict and the resolve, and he could do nothing but watch, transfixed in a state of anxiety as he observed Hélène approach. She stopped close enough to reach out and touch Anatole’s shoulder but she didn’t, just yet, trying yet again to get through to him, “Anatole?”

She flinched violently when the bow was suddenly throw with force and frustration, and awful cry. She dropped the glass in her fright as it passed closely by her head. She winced when the bow cracked against the doorframe but Dolokhov didn’t.

He stared ahead while Anatole heaved angry gasps and he started to pace. With nothing to hold onto, he pulled at the bandages on his hands and his head in his frustration as he muttered unintelligibly under his breath. He did not acknowledge them, or the broken bow, or the wetness that seeped into the carpet.

Hélène’s voice was harder when she commanded his attention, “Anatole!”

He waved her off with a jaunty dismissive handwave and paced until she stood in front of him. It forced him to stop, frozen in half a step and he met her eyes.

He looked away first, side-stepped her and resumed his pacing before pausing again. He was stopped in front of the table and the violin that laid there. His face twitched with something horrible.

With nothing to lose and nothing else to destroy, he reached for the violin.

His hand was slapped away with an audible sound and Anatole hissed as Hélène came between him and the table, “No. Absolutely not, Anatole.”

“It is mine,” He said childishly, crossing his arms.

“I won’t allow you to destroy it.”

“I – I-“ He pressed his hand into his eye and wheezed out something angry and awful. “Pl-play, I can’t – I – broke.”

“Anatole-“

“ _Broken_ ,” He hissed in clear and crisp voice as cold as ice. “Wr-wrong. _Deflected_. Broken. You – you called me – me br-broken!”

“Anatole, I wasn’t – that was not a conversation for you.”

He scoffed indignant and looked away before trying to reach around her but she slapped his hand away again. She matched his tone in her frustration, “I just want to help you, Anatole, allow me-“

“No!” He snapped. “Give me – give me-“

He tried to shove passed her, reaching for the violin but Hélène was hard and harsh, and she never liked being pushed around so she shoved back. He matched it, nearly knocking her to the floor but she did not care as she latched into his wrist, “Ow, st-stop!”

“Stop struggling,” She demanded of him, pulling him farther from the table. She wrapped her arms around him in an embrace at his back as he tried and failed to reach the instrument, “Anatole, stop it. Anatole, hush.”

“L’go,” Anatole slurred as Hélène pinned his arms to his chest in a hold so tight around his wrists that it would bruise. It was a testament to Anatole’s weakness that had taken him since he’d woken because he could not break the hold, despite his struggling, despite his pleaded demands in slurred words, “I haf’ta – ‘Lene. Stop, p’ease.”

He lost his footing trying to kick out at her and stumbled to a kneel but Hélène did not lose her grip, just adjusted it. Her steady stream of words did not falter, “Hush, Anatole, hush. You stupid child, just listen to me.”

He breathed out hard and squeezed his eyes shut, relaxing into the hold. Before anybody could think to relax, he jabbed his elbow backwards and into her ribs. It was not so much painful as it was surprising, just enough for him to rip his wrist from one of her hands and pry her fingers off the other.

He stumbled back to his feet, into the frame of the bed, and then he rushed towards the table. He nearly got ahold of the violin but Hélène practically screeched and it paused them all, “DON’T! Anatole, _don’t_ you dare!”

He froze, standing there with lip worried between his teeth in frustration and a glare set on his face, “Don’t – don’t speak to me in -in that tone.”

“Then don’t act like a child,” She snapped, angry and frustrated and “- you ungrateful, wretched _baby_. You do not get to break things in _my_ house because you are upset.”

“Speak to me, dear brother,” She demanded of him. “I have committed faults, I know. I have said things that have upset you, I know. You are hurting and you will not allow me to help you, _allow_ me that but I will not allow you to ruin what you love.”

“I _am_ ruined,” He said. He refused to meet her gaze, glaring at the distance between them. He reached out one last time because Anatole was nothing if not relentless in his pursuits, Hélène pulled the instrument from the table and hugged it to her chest. “It is _mine_ , Hélène.”

“I do – not” He paused, irritated at the slur to his words and the way he just knew that Hélène had trouble understanding him. He felt pained, like everything was building up and he just wanted the violin. “Leave me alone.”

“If you hate me than tell me,” She said to him passing the violin off to Dolokhov before approaching her brother. She curled his hands into fists in front of him, “Hit me if you want to cause pain in this world, I will allow it. Curse my name and make me bloody, Anatole, if you want to destroy something so damn much than destroy me. I deserve it, no?”

His voice was a horrible choke and it was not sure if it was a protest or an answer, _“No._ ”

“If I am so horrible than do it,” She taunted him, demanded of him. “If I am the _worst_. If I am a wicked horrible sister to you than tell me to leave and I will leave for as long as you like.”

“Tell me what it is that you want, Anatole, because I am – I have _no idea_ what it is that I am supposed to be doing,” She told him. “This is – you asked me once to heal your pain, that you heart was full of sadness because Mama had… I couldn’t help you when she died, Anatole, and I cannot fix your pain. I can only offer you comfort and you are fighting me.”

“That is the violin that she gifted to you,” She stated. “You cherish it and you love it, and I will allow you to break my things but I cannot allow that.”

He stared at her with hurt eyes and shaking fists held out limply in front of him as if he’d forgot about them. He opened his mouth to speak but his bottom lip trembled so much that he slammed it shut and pressed his lips together.

Anatole turned uneasily on his feet and walked to the chair in the window. He sat down with his back to them, staring out over the empty ground.

“Anatole?”

“I want P-Pierre,” He said, voice quiet and deafening. “Pierre will th-fix me.”

“Wh-what?” Hélène asked, heartbroken and at her wits end. “Anatole, what?”

“What?” Dolokhov echoed from the doorway.

“Ana-“

“I _want_ to talk to Pierre,” He said slowly, voice low and dangerously stressed. His shoulders were rigid, and narrow, and bony. It was almost ugly to look at. “You – you ask what I want, I want to – to speak to P-Pierre, yes? Where is he?”

Hélène let out something like a laugh, like a cry, and her shoulders drooped pathetically. She smiled something sad and hollow at the back of Anatole’s head, “You’re breaking my heart.”

“You broke mine.”

Hélène sighed and after collecting the broken bow and the violin from Dolokhov’s hands, she left the room. She did not look back or meet his eyes in the doorway.

He saw the tears gathered on her eyelashes anyways.

Dolokhov commanded his feet to move and they listened as he strode across the room, feeling much braver, much stronger, after witnessing both Anatole and Hélène sink to a new low.

He made slow work around the room, gathering supplies and picking up the glass that Hélène had dropped and sitting on the table. Then he went about redressing Anatole’s head wound and his hands, this was not a situation dissimilar to them by far and there was something warm and comfortable in that but that something as small. “What are you looking at?”

“There is a duck,” Anatole stated slowly, sounding almost calm, almost as if he had rehearsed those words to appear that way. “Fed-ya, ducks.”

He leaned over Anatole’s chair to stare out the window and sure enough, there was a duck in the common grounds.

“That is unusual.”

Anatole shrugged at that, apparently coming to the end of his rehearsed words before stating in a quiet thoughtless voice, “I was like a, uh, duck.”

“Once,” He tacked on, drawling the end of the word into a thick _ssss_ sound until it felt almost sinister. He sighed, pulling his hands into a steeple in front of his face almost as if he was praying, his eyes still hard, still angry.

Dolokhov felt frustrated, “You need to apolo-“

“No.”

“Of course, that is the word that you have no trouble with,” Dolokhov muttered darkly under his breath before stating, “You are a stubborn fool, you know that? A fool.”

“ _No_ ,” Anatole glared, opened his mouth but closed it with nothing more to add.

“No, you don’t? I am telling you now, Anatole Kuragin is a fool. She is going about it wrong but she _has_ been by your side since the beginning, she is only trying to help you.”

“And you think I am not – not grateful?”

“No, I don’t,” Dolokhov answered and Anatole adverted his eyes back to the window stubbornly. “I think you expect this of us, expect us to deal with your tantrums and to clean up your messes. You always have.”

“Then _stop_.”

“And we will continue you deal with everything you throw,” He continuing. “She will forgive you.”

“I don’t need her forgive-ness,” Anatole said slowly. “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“You are ridiculous.”

“I don’t wish to speak to anyone, Fen-ya,” He stumbled over his name in a rush to compensation on the mispronunciation. It did not slip Dolokhov’s notice and that frustrated Anatole farther. “Not ‘til P-Pierre is here.”

Dolokhov wanted to scream, the very mention of that man felt like acid on his skin, like grease added to his angry fiery soul. He itched for the gun in that drawer, itched to escape and find Pierre and to put a bullet in – “Why?”

“Why?” Anatole repeated slowly, his eyes making the trek slowly back to Dolokhov’s. “Pierre will thfix m-me, he is – is smart. You cannot he’p me.”

 _He did this to you,_ Dolokhov held the words behind his clenched teeth. _You make no sense, Anatole, he is a monster_.

Dolokhov said nothing for a long time, breathed deeply and unclenched his fist because he wanted to strike, to hit something, break something, find Pierre. He’d nearly managed calm when a thought so horrible and _real_ struck him like hot iron.

“An-Anatole, how did you get injured?”

It was not a question that he was expecting and he did not answer it for a long second before stating, “I don’t haf’to answer questions in that tone.”

Anatole gasped, a startled whine pulling from his lips as Dolokhov’s fist pulled in thick blond locks until they were eye to eye. He felt angry, felt cold and hurt, and he _needed_ to know because – because the thought was too horrible to leave unchecked. He did not remember the incident but surely, he had to know the lead up. He had to know that it was Pierre that struck the blow, surely.

He did not release his grip in any degree even after Anatole was half turned, half bent backwards in the way he forced him, “You are a fool.”

Anatole’s fingernails dug into the flesh of Dolokhov’s hand but he’d been shot once before and everything dulled in the ache of that still healing wound. He simply pulled the hand away and yanked testily on the hair until Anatole gasped and tears gathered in his eyes. “St-stop, Fe’ya. H-hurts!”

“You listen best when you have incentive,” Dolokhov stated, finding himself slipping back into his hard mask of an indifferent officer, the cruel soldier, the assassin. It was uncomfortably easy to do.

He gave a testing tug and Anatole’s eyes squeezed tight to the pain and he choked in an indignant voice laced with tears, “I didn’t – I didn’t do anything!”

“How did you get hurt?”

“Don’t you- ow!”

“I am asking the questions, Kuragin.”

“You know the – the an-“ He hissed through his teeth but offered nothing else as his head was held farther back. “-the answer!”

“Remind me of it.”

“Let go.”

Dolokhov released his hold only be a fraction of a degree and stared expectantly until Anatole worked the words from his throat with an irritated slur, “It is embarrassing.”

“More embarrassing than this?” He asked. “Any maiden that wanders onto the grounds can see you being treated like a wayward child.”

“I am _not_ a child.”

He pulled a little and Anatole hissed, “Fine.”

“I was – I fell,” He said finally. He refused to meet Dolokhov’s eyes as he spoke, “Thrown, from horse. I did not -not remember but I do – I do now.”

Dolokhov released his grip and Anatole took the opportunity to scan the horizon for any observers, satisfied when he found only the duck.

Dolokhov felt a cold kick to the gut, felt even colder when Anatole turned to him with his eyes hurt and his hand massaging where hair had been pulled. He gave him an expectant look, “Where is my drink, Fen-da?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really wanted to make the scene in I Pity You where Anatole breaks his violin that much worse.


	11. Chapter 11

 “It was not an act of cruelty.”

Dolokhov leaned against the doorframe, freshly bathed and arms crossed at an odd angle over a new tunic to compensate for the bottle of chilled vodka in his hand, “Anatole does not remember, I asked and he concocted a story of his own.”

Hélène said nothing, sat at her vanity in her room with the curtains drawn shut and candle flame flickering hauntingly across her face. She wiped roughly at her eye with a wet cloth, smearing black and gray makeup down across her cheek. She said nothing on the matter, only commenting in a flat tone that Anatole had not ate yet today.

Hélène’s hurt feelings had grown calloused as Dolokhov washed his away, and then grew into anger. She had always more productive in her fury, more effective than Anatole’s brooding, and now would be no different.

Dolokhov dreaded what actions she would take, “Hélène.”

“Fedya, I do not wish to be interrupted,” She stated coldly with the eyes of her father fixed onto his. Her voice changed to a casual aloofness, “It is improper to see a woman in this level of undress.”

She was referring to the loose binding of her corset and of the openness of her dress but Dolokhov’s eyes did not waiver from hers in the mirror’s reflection, “I believe I have seen you in worse states, Countess.”

The corner of her lips curled up but she still told him to go, “You have no honor, Dolokhov. I am a married woman.”

“And where is your honor, _married woman_ , I have never seen it,” He replied, the corner of his lips managing to same feat at her. It felt almost normal to be able to smile and mean it. “Honor is for the boring and those delusional enough to believe they could possess it.”

She hummed in agreement and then told him plainly, “I have no need for you, it is Anatole who does. Go to him, now.”

“Anatole does not need me,” He stated, his small smile back into a straight line and any light that came into Hélène’s eyes was wiped off with her lipstick. “You know how he is, stubborn as all hell and he will sulk. I cannot deal with that.”

“So, you came to me?” She asked, scrubbing at her eyes once more until every speck of paint was gone from them. She looked almost childish without the makeup, less defined and just as beautiful with her hair free from the clips and her face clean. “I will offer you nothing.”

“I don’t want anything you have,” He told her and then held up the open bottle so that it could be seen in the reflection. “I want to give you something.”

“A hangover?”

“If that is what it takes to rid us of all the horrid memories of this wretched day then so be it.”

She said nothing for a long time as she wiped whatever remaining makeup there was on her face and then she turned around. Her blouse was open more than Dolokhov had anticipated but neither of them acknowledged it for neither of them cared, “What is it that you mean, he invented his own story?”

“Anatole does not wish to speak to – to _that_ man because he knew that it would hurt you to say so,” He stated. “Like you said, he is not cruel of heart, just stupid. He thinks that he remembers.”

“He remembers that night?”

There was something like apprehension that sat in her open face, something like dread, like excitement, like _want_. Hélène wanted Anatole to remember, it was important to her for a reason that Dolokhov could not understand and he crushed that hope, “No.”

Her face fell back into a disinterested mask and she turn back around, apply powder to her cheeks, “No?”

“He remembers falling from a horse,” He reported. “He believes that is how he received his injuries.”

“A horse?” She asked. “He thinks he slipped from a horse?”

“Thrown from one,” Dolokhov replied.

Hélène paused and then covered her face with a groan, “Anatole was thrown from a horse once when he was twelve. I thought he lied to get out of a hunting trip with Father but his wrist was swollen and bruised, he broke the bone and hurt his head. It was quite serious.”

“He is confused,” She stated plainly like it hurt to think. “Did you correct him?”

“No, I – I did not think to do so.”

She thought on that for a second before going back to her makeup, “Don’t tell him.”

“What?”

“You said once that it was a blessing that he does not remember,” She stated. “I disagreed with you then but I am growing to accept that my brother will never be whole, though he will remain my brother and I love him.”

“It is a blessing,” She added and then commanded, “Do not tell him.”

“What do you suggest I do when he asks to speak to Bezukhov?”

“Lie, Dolokhov,” She stated, pausing in tracing the heavy liner along her the top of her eyelashes just to roll her eyes at him. “You are capable of such an action, yes? Tell him that Pierre is away, tell him that Pierre perished in the clutches of the French for all I care but do not tell him the truth.”

“Hélène-“

“No, my brother is an idiot,” She stated as if it was cold fact and Dolokhov felt himself bristle at it, unknowing if her jab was at Anatole’s simple-minded nature or his recent mental affliction. “You see the way he is reacting, it is bad and he will do something stupid if he knows. It will likely get him killed and I cannot handle that. Allow him happier delusions, Fedya, it does no harm.”

“It is not a delusion, Hélène, it is a lie,” He stated. “It is not right.”

“I do not wish to see my brother grow hard with hate,” She said simply, picking out a lipstick as red and as dark as blood in moonlight. “I can see the ways it is hardening his eyes in his frustration and his destruction, I do not want to see it harden his heart.”

“But Hélène, we cannot possibly-“

“He may hate me and I will allow him to,” She continued, waving off his words as unimportant. “I cannot bare to see him be infected by it any farther and neither can you.”

“If he wishes to view my _husband_ -“ the word was harsh as it spilt her face into an awful sneer “- as a friend, then so be it but he will a friend that will never come and Anatole will forget about him. It is for the best.”

“I don’t-“

“Are you going to share that bottle, Fedya, or let it go warm in your hand?”  

Dolokhov knew the dance of the Kuragins well enough to know when Hélène had decided that their conversation was over. She said what she wanted, she made her demands and she expected them to be followed. It was over, it was done, and she was content with it. He was not.

He ducked his head to her words and took a long swig of the bottle before holding it out to her, “What, no glasses?”

It is not the kind of day that warrants them, Countess.”

“Have you ever had one that did?” She asked curiously, applying her moonlight blood lipstick and then taking the bottle. She relished the burn of the alcohol, leaning a ring of lipstick around the rim.

Dolokhov sat on the bench beside her and started up the conversation she wished to be over as she started fixing her hair, “He was never going to hit you, you know that?”

“I know,” She stated coolly, there was no hurt left in her voice, no coldness. It had all been replaced with something aloof and smug, a snobbish gloat. “I have told you, he is not cruel of heart. He is not a fighter, he is only stubborn in his ways and childish in his compromising.”

Dolokhov snorted, it was an understatement and she was terribly deluded if she thought that she did not suffer the same affliction. He took another drink.

She matched him and stated, “The way to have Anatole bend to your will is not to force him to do so, do not ask.”

He leaned back against the vanity to catch her gaze, “You manipulated him.”

“As you have many times before,” She stated. “You did not befriend my brother because Anatole is a great friend to have or even a good one. At least in the beginning, you did not even _like_ him.”

He stiffened at her words and she took note of it as she continued, “You befriended him because he was young, because he is simple and comes from wealth, and you knew that you could use that to your advantage.”

He gritted his teeth, eyes dropping from her, and he debated saying nothing but Hélène would take it as more proof that she was right, “I became his friend because I saw a naïve prince that was in way over his head in the war efforts.”

“That is a nice story that you have created, Dolokhov,” She said. “But it is no truth, you became his friend because Anatole is trouble, and pretty, and open doors that have been closed to you. You are attracted to the worst things you can have and Anatole is that.”

“And of course,” She said smugly. “He was immature enough to think not of hidden intentions when you first met. It allowed you to get him drunk and cheat him out of a thousand rubbles in a game he’d never played.”

“That is not-“

“I know this because I was the one to give Anatole the money,” She added, rising an eyebrow at him as if to challenge him to lie. “He was horribly embarrassed to go to our father so he came to me. I do not think less of you for it.”

“I have never made Anatole do anything he did not want to,” He defended but the argument was weak.

“But you have made him _want_ to do it.”

“The bastard is too stubborn to be swayed.”

“That is because you are heavy-handed in most of your attempts, Dolokhov,” She told him. “You must give him an alternative that is much too awful to consider and you must _mean_ it, he will grow confused with conflict and he will give in to the easiest solution.”

“I had no fear that he would cause me any harm,” She added primly and Dolokhov was reminded that Hélène always thought that she was cleverer than everybody else. “A little bump to the ribs is nothing worse than how we use to play as children but to hit me, Anatole was horrified at the thought. I pushed it and he retreated to a better option, he lost his fight and he _listened_ to me.”

She took the bottle from his hand and took a long swig of it before standing. She moved about the room pulling dresses from her wardrobe and finally he asked, “Where is it that you are planning to go?”

“I have not decided if I am going anywhere,” She said in a voice that suggested she already had. “But the walls feel as if they are closing on me and if Anatole wishes to not see me that I have no purpose here.”

“Anatole never stays angry for long.”

“Anatole has never tried to break an instrument before,” She countered. “He is changed now, I do not think it is for the better.”

Hélène-“

“Anatole is persistent in most cases, his anger is one of them,” She said before adding in a voice that suggested she thought what she was saying was utterly ridiculous, “Mother used to tell us that Anatole must be allowed to act out his tantrums in their full in order to keep his mind and heart open.”

“That is…”

“Absolute garbage?” She asked, taking the bottle from his hand and drinking. “I agree but I am _tired_ , Dolokhov. I am tired of seeing exhaustion and frustration in his face and tired of it being directed at me. I will wait until it has run its course and when he wishes to see me than he will, thought it may pain me.”

“So, you are leaving?”

She hummed, “I do think now is the time for Hélène Kuragina to salvage what has remained of the Kuragin name in Moscow.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dun, dun, dun, this was mostly filler. We will proceed with advancing the plot in the next chapter.


	12. Chapter 12

For as long as winters were long and Kuragins stubborn, no one could sulk like Anatole.

Dolokhov had never encountered somebody that had so effortlessly combined blatantly ignoring you with childish insults and whining like Anatole had. No one could so effectively grate his nerves into pieces as Anatole could.

It was best to avoid him in these moment but it was also necessary not to let him starve to death so Dolokhov relented.

When Hélène slipped from the room with her plump bare shoulders, a dress of deep maroon, and his bottle of vodka, and then slipped from the silent manor, Dolokhov slipped into the kitchen. He ordered the servants around to bid his time, busied himself with eating a meal of his own before trekking up the stairs with a steaming plate and a pitcher of water.

He expected to find the prince asleep, as it was often the case. He was not expecting, however, was to find an empty room and no prince in sight. He paused, sitting the plate down on the table, “Anatole?”

The empty room offered no answer. He called again, louder, “Anatole?”

A part of his mind gave up on rational thought and got immediately frustrated at the immaturity of his friend. He threw open the door to the closet as if he would be inside of it, stating to the clothes, “Your ideals of humor are as childish as they are stupid, _prince._ ”

“Oh, uh…”

Dolokhov spun on his feet, turning around so fast that he startled the poor servant so severely that she dropped the basket of linens she was carrying, “What do you want?”

“Oh, um, Mr. Dolokhov,” She greeted with a quick curtsey, her voice too soft for his harsh tone and her hands shaking as they clutched the cross around her neck nervously. “Is there – may I help you with anything, sir?”

“Y-yes!” He exclaimed, waving his hand around the room. He ignored the way she flinched at the bite in his voice, though he almost found it in him to feel bad about it. “Obviously, where is Anatole?”

“Prince Anatole is – well, he asked for assistance,” She replied, hastily picking up the linens. He gave her an impatient look so she continued in a rush, “He called from the bed for water and when I retrieved some, he insisted that I aid his travel to his study. I am retrieving a blanket for him.”

“You – you _listened_ to him?” He asked harshly. “Surely, you are not blind. Could you not see that he is clearly injured? He should be in bed.”

“He was persistent, sir,” She squeaked. “He is Count Bezukhov’s brother-in-law, and the Countess, she-“

“No, no,” Dolokhov waved off, taking a deep breath and calming himself down before he worked the girl into a state of panic that she could not return from.

He observed her as he reduced the fire within him into a simmer. She was young, mousey with hair the color of wheat and uninteresting eyes, plain in both appearance and confidence. She was not Anatole’s type by any means but Anatole had never been above using his charm on unexpecting girls to get what he wanted. He could not fault her for that.

He sighed, “No, go back to your work, I will take this blanket to him.”

“I apolo-“

“Don’t,” He replied, pulling one of the extra blankets from the bed and folding it over his arm. “You did as you were told, I cannot fault you for doing your job.”

She nodded curtly before saying awkward, “I must be finishing the laundry.”

She took her leave and soon after, Dolokhov did as well. He was not sure what it was exactly that he expected to find in the study but at the very least, it was a pleasant surprise to see that Anatole hid his malnutrition beneath a clean shirt.

Anatole was standing with his back to the door, leaning against the desk as he scoured the surface for something. In one hand, there was already a bundle of paper curled in his fist and pen held between his teeth. He seemed too deep in his search to notice Dolokhov in the doorway.

It was not until he cleared his throat and Anatole startled enough to drop the pen from his lips in his haste to turn around that he notices that he was not alone. He rolled his eyes and turned his back, “No.”

“I have offered you nothing to deny.”

“Your _presence_ ,” Anatole muttered, turning back to the desk. After a while, he appeared to find what it was that he wanted because he used furniture to keep him steady as he dragged himself to the couch. He gave Dolokhov a weary look, “Are you planning to take me back?”

“Not in this moment,” He replied. “I brought dinner to your room, would you like me to have it brought here?”

Anatole waved him off, separating the papers be brought over into two neat piles before realizing that he no longer had a pen. Dolokhov saved him the trouble of getting up by striding across the room to retrieve it from the floor.

He placed ink on the table beside the pen because Anatole had forgotten it as well. He then placed the blanket around the prince’s shoulders before moving to sit in a chair close by. Anatole sent him an annoyed look, “I wish to be ‘lone, Dol’khff.”

“That appears to be the mood of the Kuragins today.”

Anatole narrowed his eyes and stared at the doorway expectantly, “Where is H- Hélène?”

“She went out,” He stated, seeing no point in lying about it. Anatole’s face morphed into surprise and then annoyance at it, and he picked up the pen but didn’t write anything. “I believe she will be back later. What is it that you are doing?”

“M-Mourning my ind-independence,” He stated. “I do not need a keeper.”

“I am not your keeper,” He hummed, acknowledging the edge in Anatole’s voice and ignoring it. He picked up a book at random and opened it. “I won’t be a bother, you’ll hardly know I’m here.”

“But I _already_ know that you are,” He said slowly, stressing each syllable so it came out clear. “Go ah-way.”

It was Dolokhov this time to not respond, he slouched into the chair far enough that he could place his boots upon the table. He opened the book, realizing that it was a book of maps and offered his nothing to read. He stared at it anyways.

“You are bothering me,” Anatole stated loudly. “Leave me – my study. You – you hate me anyways.”

“I never said that I hate you,” Dolokhov stated, placing the book aside happily. He gave Anatole a look. “Do not twist my words to fit your anger, I told you that I was not a consolation prize for you to be affectionate to when you have no one better. That is using people, Anatole.”

“Would you – would you kiss me now,” He asked quietly, avoiding his eyes for the ceiling. There a fierce blush working its way up his neck and coloring his cheeks. “If I asked, w-would you?”

Dolokhov was quiet for a moment, marveling in the way that Anatole could be so endearingly clueless and frustratingly ignorant all at once. When he did speak, his voice was soft but firm, “I would not.”

Anatole’s face fell into a sort of despair, flushing a worse shade of red.

“Not because I would not enjoy it,” Dolokhov continued, happy enough that Anatole was refusing to meet his gaze because he felt his own face heating up. “But because it would not be an act of enjoyment, it would be a point that you’d wish to prove. It would still be using me to an end, Anatole, you understand that?”

“I – we _all_ use people.”

“So, you don’t understand?”

Anatole huffed, frustrated with both Dolokhov and his sloppy shaky handwriting. He crumbled the paper into a ball and threw it to the floor before sinking back into the couch. He pulled his knees up to his chin before saying, “I did not want – it was not my in-intention that you f-feel that way.”

He leaned sideway until he was horizontal, muttering, “Not my fault _you_ misunderstood.”

“I did not misunderstand your-“

Anatole was not one for apologizes and even if he was becoming aware of the ways that he was wrong, he would never admit so. He did not offer anything more on the subject and did wish to continue to have this discussion so he changed the topic to a mundane one, “Where have the servants gone?”  

Dolokhov shrugged his shoulders and ran his hand through his damp hair. He hadn’t noticed until that moment that there was a lack of servants running around the Bezukhov manor, “I don’t know.”

They fell into a silent that was neither uncomfortable nor comfortable after that, and Dolokhov picked up the book once more. He watched over the top of it as Anatole scooped up the pile where the papers were already written on and held them to his chest.

He was startled when Anatole suddenly spoke up, “’member that – that time Kut-Kutusov was fur-furious with us.”

“Furious with you, surely, which time are you referring?” He asked. “There are many to draw from.”

Anatole snorted to himself, his eyes remaining closed. There was something like a fond smile on his lips, “The time in the forest.”

“Yeah,” Dolokhov huffed in disbelief, he rolled his eyes. “That is what you are choosing to remember? You spent that entire morning leading up in circles with the map in _rain.”_

“I did not _chose_ to navigate us,” Anatole justified. “I never said I was good with a map.”

“You certainly implied it.”

“I said that I had a generous amount of geography lessons,” He stated. “It was you that insisted that I should be the one with the map.”

“Only because I have seen you with a gun,” He shot back humorously. “I feared for the horses, I am serious.”

Anatole cracked an eye open at that and stated, “You are Dolokhov the assassin, nothing frightens you.”

“Why is it that you are remembering this?” Dolokhov asked. He knew that Anatole admired his service history, had been told enough times by the stumbling and drunk prince. He knew that Anatole was sometimes jealous of his notoriety, of his rank, and Dolokhov relished in the accomplishment of it but he had never quite known what to do with the hero-worship that sometimes slipped into Anatole’s voice. “It is not a pleasant memory.”

Anatole shook his head, reaching out blindly to fiddle with the pen, “Kutusov got angry with me then.”

Fedya froze in his heart and in his soul at Anatole’s closed eyes and his soft voice, wondering if this was Anatole’s way of saying he remembered. It was unlike Anatole not be straight to the point, almost insultingly blunt in his intentions and wants, but it was not unheard of.

Anatole could talk in lengths about nothing while treading the perimeter of what was to be discussed. If he was uncomfortable or nervous, or if he was afraid and did not want to admit it, he’d dance around the topics the way he would a dance floor.

He thought to ask of Pierre, to ask of that night and what had happened, but instead he simply said, “I remember that Kutusov threw his gun at your head in his exasperation.”

“He missed.”

“Which is why he sent you into the woods,” Dolokhov stated plainly and Anatole’s face spilt into an amused grin, “to dig your own grave.”

The effort Anatole was making to stay quiet broke into a hysterical giggling laugh and his eyes shined with something that had not been there in a long time. Mirth, Anatole was enjoying himself. Dolokhov cracked a smile at it and waited for him to pull himself together enough to speak.

“I thought he would put me in it that night,” Anatole admitted, wiping at the tears in his eyes. “I have never seen somebody so angry.”

“We were all cold, and tired, and it had been raining,” Dolokhov remembered, saying words just to keep Anatole talking. He could not see where this conversation was leading to. “He was not thinking straight, you are lucky that is all he did.”

“You made him see reason,” He stated. “He did not shoot me.”

“He was never going to shoot you, we were down too many men as is.”

“Yes, yes,” Anatole waved his hand dismissively, “And his gun was in a hedge.”

Dolokhov shook his head amused, “You are a ridiculous prince.”

“You helped me dig.”

The laugh that crawled up Dolokhov’s throat startled them both as he exclaimed, “Well, yes! You looked pathetic in the rain and your muddy uniform, it pulled at my heart strings.”

Anatole laughed as well, “Heart strings, eh? You say that you have none.”

“Is there a reason that you are remembering this or just reminiscing?”

 “Yes, there is a reason,” Anatole stated, sitting up, the laughter died from his face as the amusing dissipated from his eyes. He took on a rather severe look. “Do you re-remember what it was that I told you in the – the grave?”

“Anatole, it was many years ago.”

“I said that I owed you a debt,” He stated, oddly serious. “I wish to repay it to you now.”

“I don’t…” Dolokhov trailed off, unable to figure out where Anatole was going with this. “It is not you that decides when and how you pay a debt to me.”

“Why not?” He asked. “I have already made up my mind, I wish to aid you in bedding a wife, Fe-da.”

“I – _what_?”

“A _wife_ ,” Anatole stressed the word, confusing Dolokhov’s confusion as being because of his speech and not because of the absurdity of his words. “Do you… you underst _and_?”

“I – yes, the words but – why?”

“You are in love,” He stated simply, happily, and unloading his fist full of papers onto the table. Dolokhov recognized them immediately.

Anatole, the perfectionist, unhappy with his own words and his handwriting. Anatole, who got what he wanted when he wanted it because Dolokhov was weak when it came to pretty blue eyes and sung praises of his skills and talents from a prince who could think passed his own vanity. They were love letters in Dolokhov’s handwriting, written for Anatole…to Natasha Rostova.

He felt the blood drain from his face and that fire within him doused to almost nothing as a cold winter wind stung his heart.

Anatole mistook his paleness as embarrassment and assured him, “No need to be embarrassed, mon cher, you clearly love her. It is lovely.”

“Wh-what?”

“Do not be em-bar-rassed,” Anatole said slowly. “There is – is no dishonor in marrying thor – _for_ love.”

“I…” Dolokhov shook his head. “I don’t understand, where did you find those?”

“On the desk,” Anatole replied offhandedly. “This – this Natalie, if you feel this strongly than you must – you must deliver the letters, Fen-ya! You should _marry_ her. It matters little to the – to the heart if she is a servant.”

Anatole’s words were slurring together in his excitement but Dolokhov got the gist of it but, “No, Anatole.”

“ _Yesth,_ ” He insisted. “You love her.”

“I am lost,” Dolokhov stated. “A servant?”

“Natalie,” Anatole said, oblivious as to why Dolokhov was being so difficult with him and clueless as to why that name stabbed at his heart. “She is – is beautiful, a little plain but that means noth-nothing to the m-matters of the heart.”

Dolokhov thought of the mousey girl with the wheat colored hair and wondered if that was Natalie but a more pressing thought occurred to him, “I wrote these letters.”

“I know your handwriting, mon cher, it is lovely.”

 _For you_.

“There is – why did you think that it is to a servant?” Dolokhov asked.

Anatole gave him a confused look and asked, “Do you know another Natalie in Moscow? I have not been introduced.”

Dolokhov was quiet for a moment and then everything crashed within him in an awful, terrible manner because Anatole did not _remember_. He had woken up confused of the date, of events, and they assumed that it was because of his unconsciousness and the time missed but not – he did not remember Natasha.

It seemed almost cruel to take that from him when this was the ending result.

Anatole flushed a color worse than death and asked in an awkward embarrassed tone, “Have I mis-misunderstood?”

“Y-yes,” Dolokhov snapped from his thought. “I – they are not for me?”

“They are not?”

 _They’re for you, for your Natasha_. “I wrong them for a…a servant.”

“Oh?” He perked up, “Which one is in love with dear Natalie?”

Dolokhov cursed beneath his breath because he did not _know_ any of the servants and unlike Anatole, he did not make it a point to learn their names. He shrugged his shoulders in an involuntary tick and said, “He is not an employee of your sister’s anymore, it matters little now.”

Anatole’s face fell to disappointed before perking up again, “Very well, he was smart to go to you. You are a talented writer, Fedya.”

“Thank you, Anatole.”

“And I, uh…” He trailed off, glaring down to his hands. “May I borrow your services, my handwriting is a-appalling at this, uh, present time.”

“You wish to write a letter?”

“Yesth,” He nodded eagerly. “To P-Pierre, he appears to be away.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo, technically this could probably be considered more filler but on the plus side, it's also a bit fluffy. 
> 
> It is almost as if I just remembered that I needed to address the fact that Anatole has no memory of Natasha. We will eventually advanced this plot.


	13. Chapter 13

Hélène cared little for most things.

It had never been a case of heartlessness, of being cold, or meticulous, or _evil_ as she knew Pierre sometimes thought she was. It had nothing to do with honor or lack of, nothing to do with her upbringing or her family. It was simply that she did not care.

She cared so very little of her own reputation in the eyes of Moscow’s ‘ _elite’_ when the babble of the city’s nobodies and gossips never reached the respectable ears of Petersburg. She cared not at all of what was whispered behind her back because she knew that no one would dare say it to her face. She did not care for the weak-minded and dim-witted inhabitance of Moscow.

She wished for nothing more than to tear them all down and strip them of their confidence and self-importance with wrath and words every time she heard the sneer of her brother’s name, every _poor little Hélène_ that passed by her ears about the oh so many woes she faced cleaning up after her dreadful brother. She cared little but she cared a lot about Anatole.

It was not the opera she wished to go, it was not even the club thought that was where she ended up. She wanted a cup of tea to soother the hurricane in her chest and something stiff that would burn her throat. She wanted to drown her sorrows someplace dark, somewhere that did not remind her of her failings.

She wanted her brother back, if she was honest, she wanted his smiling eyes, and the curl of his lips, and the way he swayed with her back and forth when they were both so drunk and happy.

She wanted that night in the club when the music was a thudding beat in time with her heart and Anatole was cherry-cheeked with drink and loose with the feelings of love. She wanted the warmth of vodka and the energy of the dance floor before the duel, before the blood that poured from Dolokhov’s shoulder, before the ruin. She wanted to live in that moment and forget all that happened after.

It was all she wanted, to forget. She wanted to forget Anatole’s hurt, his slurred words, and all the ways she felt small and cold inside.

It had a long cold winter that passed when Anatole left to join the war efforts but this one felt so much worse, so much longer. Colder.

Anatole was changed and it was settling into her consciousness that he would not return to her as he was, and it hurt. She knew in her rationality that it was unfair of her to expect him to but she was a princess that grew up getting what she wanted and she _wanted_ this, wanted him the way he was. She wanted-

“A bottle.”

Hélène flagged down the bartender, her made her request with a smile on her face and a suggestive tone as she told him to put it on Pierre’s tab. The smile dropped and her foot tapped impatiently under the bar as she waited for his return, the smile only returning when something chilled and expensive was passed to her, “Charming.”

Hélène made her rounds, she smiled and she swayed as she said nothing of Anatole being in Petersburg and yet confirmed all of their suspicions of the fact. She played her part with manipulative skill and crafted words as she spoke to fed their need for family dysfunction. They hung onto her every word and she drank.

She filled her glass and she drank.

It was all so fake.

“Excuse me,” She said with a pleasant smile, eyes unnoticeably empty, and a bottle a quarter finished. She pushed away from the table with gusto and glee and offered a weak excuse to disappear from discussing the matters of new dress patterns and if they were too scandalous. “Excuse me, excuse me, mes chéris, I must be going.”

She fixed her most lovely smile as she curtsied, “I appear to have found my… _hus_ band, I wish to speak to him in this moment.”

Her smile dropped for the briefest of seconds into something like disgust, like repulsion, like hate before being fixed with that society-clever smile, big and fake rows of teeth that felt more of a cringe than anything else. She watched the heavy steps of Pierre as he walked into the club and shed his coat and his hat, he kept his knapsack the way she kept hers.

She watched him fumble with conversation, always so eager to discuss Napoleon and the war with anybody that was unfortunate to be discussing it near him. She watched as he drank, guzzle down drinks with a desperation she never seen before, and she hated him.

She watched him and with every step he took, she hated him even more. She drank straight from the bottle.

“Drink, drink, drink,” She taunted at Pierre’s second, third, fourth drink in so many minutes. Her tongue made a clicking sound against her teeth as she circled him, eyes critical, hard, and drunk. “Keep drinking, old man.”

“Hélène?” Pierre sounded surprised, startled out of the conversation and turning to her. His face morphed into a pale stricken expression and he looked down to his feet in shame and guilt.

She ignored him and turned her smile to the occupant of the table, “Marya, how is little Natasha?”

Marya’s lips folded into a thin line and she tutted disapprovingly. She took a sip of her tea and said nothing so Hélène did, “Oh, I hear that she is so terrible unwell. A sickness, they say.”

She smirked something base and cringing, “I was unaware arsenic was a sickness now, I always thought it was poison.”

Marya’s eyes hardened and her anger outran her patience, “Yes, well, you would know, now wouldn’t you?”

If Hélène was surprised by word or tone, it did not show on her face. Instead her face cracked into a smile, toothy and worrying, and she sat the bottle down loudly on top of the table and leaned across it, “No, you are mistaken.”

“I do not believe that I am, Countess.”

“My mother took her gin with cyanide, my dear, not arsenic,” She said plainly, vicious in its simplicity and cold to the touch. It was an unspoken rumor of the late Kuragina, a confirmation Marya was not expecting and felt suddenly stricken by. “She died delusional with pain and infection from the blood-letting. Don’t you remember, Pierre, you visited her many times in her last days. She was quite feverish.”

“I, uh, yes,” He muttered, stunned by the words, by the simple truth and fact. He had not known the cause of her illness. “She was quite…delusional.”

“I hope Natasha fares much better,” Hélène noted, tilting her head and pouting. “She is so young, it would be ashamed if such a rash decision ruined her completely.”

Hélène sighed like some would about the far-off war when they had no understanding of the severity of it, the way you would when consequences mean little to you, and she grabbed her bottle. Held it above her head as a toast, “Here is to the health of married woman.”

She took a drink and the winced dramatically, “Oh, that’s right. How’d that engagement go, has Pierre talked to Prince Andrey? You would ask that of him.”

Marya’s lips were pressed so thin that they disappeared into her face, leaving behind something hateful and harsh. She was not one to air her own laundry and she did not appreciate Hélène’s drunken attempts. She said nothing and the countess sneered in delight, laughing, “Well, _husband_ , have you?”

Pierre’s stricken face morphed into a queasy guilt, “No.”

“Coward.”

“I think – Countess, you are making a fool of yourself,” Marya finally stated. “Whereas that is acceptable among your scoundrels, it is not at my table. Behave.”

“Yes, mother,” She mocked, rolling her eyes. “What scoundrels are you referring to, my brother?”

Pierre winced but Marya did not, “There is your assassin, where is he tonight?”

“I hear that he is in Petersburg,” She answered lightly. “What was it now, running amuck with my dear Anatole, terrorizing Russia’s high society. I can only guess that he will still be there when I return home, if I return home. The night is young.”

 “You are not,” Marya said simply. “May the time be upon us that you start to act your age?”

“May it be time that you do?” She asked back sarcastically. “You are grown, not dead, Marya, _live_. Live for the ones that cannot, how many have we lost to war and senseless violence?”

Hélène heard a sharp intake of breath from her side but did not turn to Pierre. She watched the way Marya’s face softened into something like pity for her before freezing back into a hard expression.

Marya hated Anatole, she always had and even more so now. She wished him dead, she never wanted him to wake up, and a part of Hélène wanted to blame her for it all. She should have kept trace of her ward, her Natasha.

She grabbed Pierre’s arm when he tried to slip away, no doubt to drown his guilt in more liquor, “No, no, you stay.”

“Drink, old man,” She told him, demanded of him, and tilted her bottle into his glass until it was full and overfilling.

“Hélène!” He startled away as the liquid poured over his hand and onto his shoes. He grabbed the bottle by the neck and took it from her with an ease, sitting it down onto the table.

“Worry not for your corpulence, _stupid_ husband,” She told him, all laughing and smiling gone. “The world will lose nothing without you in it.”

“Excuse us,” Pierre said softly to Marya, grabbing Hélène by the arm but she would not be moved until she retrieved the bottle. She offered a sweetly-stated insult, a condescending wish for Natasha’s health, and ripped her arm away from Pierre’s hold so violently she nearly collided with a waiter.

“I am capable of walking all on my own, thank you.”

He found a booth in the back, it would not block them from the curious eyes of all the on-lookers but it would keep the conversation private. Hélène dropped down, tilting the bottle to her lips until vodka drippled from the side of her mouth, “ _What_ do you want, Pierre?”

“What do _I_ –“ He stopped himself from asking what it was that she was doing, what it was that she wanted when she approached him and made an ass of the both of them. “How are you, uh, holding up, Hélène?”

“Peachy.”

“Is there anything I can offer you to help?”

“Yes,” She stated, leaning across the table and he leaned in too. Hélène had an alluring quality to her and always would, he never faulted himself for falling for it. “Bring my brother back.”

Hélène could see her irrationalities, she could understand all it was that Dolokhov was frustrated with about her behavior but she cared little about being rational in these moment. She cared little about everything except for her brother.

“Trade places with him,” She demanded. “Does all of your money buy me the impossible?”

“Hélène-“

“Or disappear from my life,” She leaned back and took another swig. “I want no husband in you, I want _nothing_ from you, only that which you took from me and is lost forever.”

“I can sent for your father-“

“No.”

“I will pay for you to journey to-“

“ _No_.”

“If it is a divorce you want-“

“A divorce? A divorce, ha!” She baulked at the thought. “And what would people think? What would I tell my father? You want me to be shamed in his eyes as some failed wife because it would be me that he blamed, me that Moscow blamed, Petersburg blamed. Where is the tenderness in your fat heart?”

“I just want to help you, Hélène. Tell me what it is that you want?”

She stared at him unblinking for an unnerving pause and then pulled from her bag the broken bow, “Fix it.”

“You broke so many things,” She stated. “Fix this, now.”

“Okay.”

She slid into her seat and pressed her forehead against the edge of the table top. She felt a swell of tears in her eyes and cursed her stupid emotions for being so hysterical, she pushed it down.

She did not want to give the bow away, a childish part of her did not want Pierre to have it. She straightened her spine and blanked her face, “It is of importance, as you know, the bow is my Anatole’s.”

Pierre placed the bow within his knapsack with his books and recently purchased paper. He sighed to himself, “ _was_ , Hélène. It is not good for you to-“

“Have lost my brother to your senseless violence,” She snapped. “No, it _was_ not good for me.”

“I was worried for you,” He told her. “You look as if you’re waning, exhausted and thin. I hate seeing this look on you.”

“You put it there that night,” She stated. “So, look at me, Pierre, _look at me!_ ”

She reached across the table, a fistful of his beard as she forced him to meet the angry fires in her eyes, all the cracks in his façade, the hurt within her, “You hide in your room at the Inn, you pretend your conversations, but you did this.”

“You wanted to break my spirit, my love, make me as wretched and awful as your sad old soul?” She hissed. “Well, you win. I have no brother and no desire. You have broken my soul and now we are on the same pathetic level.”

“Be happy, Pierre,” She said in a chilled tone, leaning farther across the table with a charming smile on her face. She pressed a kiss to his lips and leaned back as if they had shared a marvelous joke, she even laughed.

It was an act for all the watchful eyes, one that said that there was no problem in Moscow for the Bezukhovs. It was an act that would fall to pieces at the door when Hélène left for the manor and he went to the Inn but it got all those watchful eyes to lose interest in their drama for the moment.

It was scary the way that it worked, the way Hélène could twist perception, could manipulate the world around her. The way she lied so seamless and effortless, “I have only one question.”

“The bow as broken against the doorframe,” She stated. “You know how boys are.”

Even that felt like a lie, so believable that it could only be the truth. Pierre had no feat imagining just the kind of anger that plagued a deadly assassin with a hurt heart and no battle to relieve it. He imagined Dolokhov wanted blood.

Pierre had no reason not to believe, no one ever did, so he did, “Are you in danger?”

“I never am,” She replied with ease. “How long will the bow take?”

“I am not sure, a few days I would imagine,” He stated. “I will handle it with care but that is not my question.”

She looked curiously at him before asking, “What is it?”

“You never told me of your mother.”

“Why would I?” She asked. “It is something that is known only between myself, my father, and the doctor that treated her. I never told anybody until now, not even Anatole, and I told Marya to knock her off her feet.”

Hélène smirked to herself, “Once she puts thought to it, she won’t believe a word I said. There was no risk in it.”

“You – that is something that you believe?”

“It is something that I know,” She stated. “The old dames are predictable, as are you. You never asked a question.”

“Have you – do you lie? To me, often.”

Hélène’s brow furrowed for only a second before evening out and she answered with open honestly, “Yes. I am dishonest as we speak now, Pierre. It is to protect you and to protect myself, and my Anatole.”

“You are free to find the truth,” She told him. “But you cannot uncover it and you cannot hide from their consequences if you do, so don’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Technically I did not kill Aline in this work, I killed her off in chapter 1 of I Pity You. Poor woman, I haven't written anything for Great Comet where she is alive.


	14. Chapter 14

The Bezukhov manor was ridiculous in its enormity, in its unnecessary abundance, in the display of wealth and pointless excess.

The manor was deep cherry walls and wooden floors that stretched long and wide for miles with decorative rugs and paintings on the walls, that stretched and stretched and offered only twists and turns but felt of no end. It was empty room upon empty room with dusty sheets covering unused furniture and no hope of ever finding use for them.

It was forgotten halls and forgotten rooms, dust hanging in the air and settling in the back of Dolokhov’s throat to an irritating degree. He wondered, not for the first time, why the hell Anatole picked a study so damn far from the center of the house in the first place.

“It would be faster if you allowed me to help you.”

There was a simplicity and an ease in convincing Anatole to go back to bed, which was to say that he was less difficult than he could have been but was still annoying about it.

After an hour of watching the prince toss and turn, and fail to find sleep on his dreadfully uncomfortable couch, Dolokhov told him to go back to his room. After another hour of ‘no’s and denials, and Dolokhov threatened to rip the letter to Pierre into pieces, Anatole complied with mild complaint.

He had insisted, however, that he could walk unaided.

“Anatole, allow me to help you.”

Anatole said nothing, concentrating on keeping his feet beneath him and using the wall as a balance and a guide. Dolokhov could physically _feel_ the exertion of energy pouring from him.

“I am per-perfectly capable on m’ own.”

Dolokhov rolled his eyes and cross his arms but refrained from saying another word, Anatole’s stubbornness would win out against pride and he was in no mood to put it to the test, “Your day has been fatiguing, there is no fault in being tired.”

“I slept in, I napped like a child,” Anatole muttered, hand gliding along the table they came across before finding the wall once more. “I am awake, rested.”

“You are injured, sleeping in the day is acceptable.”

They were coming to the end of the hallway and Dolokhov was partly curious as to what Anatole planned to do when wall ran out but curiosity did not outweigh his desire not to see his friend crack his head open because of he was an idiot.

“Got m’ letter?”

“Yes, Anatole, as I have the last three times you asked.”

“Don’t rip it.”

“I said that I wouldn’t.”

The wall came to an end and Anatole considered his options. He almost looked as if he was going to ask for help before pushing away from the wall, staggering and then righting himself without aid, “I can do it, I told you.”

“I see that.”

“I am not weak,” He said. “Not – not broken.”

“I did not say that you were,” Dolokhov told him softly, forcing himself to keep his hands by his side and not to reach out when Anatole tripped over the end of a rug. He walked beside him, tense and waiting. “You are injured, I will not think less of you for needing help.”

“I do not care what you think of me.”

Anatole’s response was brisk and sharp with an undertone of defensiveness but Dolokhov did not take it to heart. It had once been true.

Anatole cared little of the words of the gossips as long as those words and all their critical eyes were on him. He did not care if what was being said was good things or bad, if they thought highly of him or not, just as long as they were speaking of him. He cared that the narrative was his.

He simply did not have the capacity to care, to conform to what was expected of him so he embraced the role he played. And he played it to perfection.

It was that which was going to break Anatole’s spirit, losing his perfection, his narrative. Dolokhov realized it like a cold embrace, Hélène had not been wrong about that.

“An-“

Anatole’s knees lost their battle with gravity, buckling beneath his weight without warning and he went down hard before Dolokhov could react. His knees and the palm of his hand connected with the floor in one jarring moment.

Anatole’s arms were shaking as he tried to push up from the floor, managing to only get seated with his back pressed to the wall. He breathed a shocking gasp and held his already injured hands to his chest.

Dolokhov crouched in front of him and took his hands despite the protest. He observed the bandages and cuts beneath them, “You did not reopen them, you are fine.”

“Hurts.”

“I bet,” He sighed, patting Anatole’s knee where he knew it would be bruised tomorrow. “See why you should accept my help now, stubborn fool?”

“You are the fool, not me.”

“I am not on the floor.”

“I was – you are not floating,” Anatole muttered, leaning back against the wall. “You are on the floor.”

“Ha,” Dolokhov deadpanned, reaching for Anatole but his was batted away. “You have jokes.”

Anatole’s jaw jutted out in what could only be a pout and he closed his eyes. He pressed his hand into his eyes before stating, “I do not need help.”

“Is that so?”

“I am resting,” He stated, his hands dropped into his lap and he blinked slowly. He hummed something under his breath before waving a hand out, “You can continue on, go. I am content where I am.”

“No,” Dolokhov said with another sigh, grabbing Anatole’s arm. “Don’t be ridiculous, I am not going to leave you on the dusty floor. Get up.”

Anatole went boneless in every attempt to bring him to his feet. The man was thin and light but he was tall and _annoying_. “Anatole, you cannot stay on the floor.”

He did not respond with words, only sliding farther across the floor that he might as well have been laying down. His point was made, Anatole was not going to be moved.

Dolokhov sighed, “Anatole, seriously?”

“Don’t touch me,” He muttered, curling his legs up to his chest. “This is my choice.”

“This is nonsense, childish nonsense,” Dolokhov threw his hands into the air and paced a short distance in front of the prince. “You are exhausted, I realize this.”

“Then go away.”

He shot Anatole a look of no effect because Anatole’s eyes were shut, “There is no need for this ridiculous behavior, let me help you make it back to your room.”

There was no response and Dolokhov thought that Anatole might have fallen asleep. He nudged his foot with his boot, “Anatole, let’s go.”

“I do not need help,” Anatole insisted, somehow managing to hold that air of superiority while lying in dust and grime. “I wish to remain here.”

“You are just too tired to make it unaided back to your room, admit that.”

“No.”

“I will pick you up.”

Anatole snorted, “You – you cannot, don’t be ridiculous.”

“It is you that are lying on the floor.”

“This – this pride of yours,” Dolokhov muttered, running his hands in his hair. “It will get you killed.”

“How so?”

“Because I am going to kill you, foolish prince, if you do not accept my help.”

Anatole opened eyes just to narrow them. He appeared to be weighing his options so Dolokhov provided some incentive, “I will leave you if you wish for that but it is a long walk back to your room. I won’t return.”

Anatole’s eyes narrowed even more and he sat up straighter, “I…. there are conditions.”

“With you, there always are.”

“I wish t-to bathe,” Anatole told him. “I smell of spilt vodka and perspiration.”

“Okay.”

“And – and change the sheets on my bed.”

“…why?” He asked and then shook his head. “I don’t care, yes, I can do that. Will you stand now?”

“Y-yesth.”

Dolokhov passed Anatole off on a servant for a bath and then went in search of the girl with the basket of linens he had spoken with early when there was a knock at the door.

He froze in the front hall, almost considered pretending not to be there until he made eye contact with the visitor through the colored glass. He narrowed his eyes, “What do you want?”

Rather it was the abrupt lack of greeting, the gruffness of Dolokhov’s tone, or just surprise that he was there, the response of it was a startled, “Oh, uh…”

“Yes?’ Dolokhov asked impatiently. “I do not believe that Marya would be pleased to know that you were here, Sonya, so what is it?”

“Is, uh, the Countess-“

“She left hours ago, she had yet to return. I do not know where she is.”

“Oh,” Sonya shivered in her white high-collared coat, looking nervously back to her waiting troika before back to him.

Dolokhov took pity though he could not pinpoint why and held the door open for her, “You are letting the heat out.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Dolokhov,” He corrected. “…Fedya, if you wish. What is it you have?”

“Oh,” She spooked, holding out the container in her hand. “It is a pie, cherry. I made it myself.”

“…why?” He asked, accepting it as she passed it to him. With nothing to do with her hands, she held them together in front of her in a way that looked uncomfortable. “And, uh, yes, thank you. It looks delicious.”

“Thank you,” She smiled awkwardly. “Mist- Dolokhov, Fedya.”

“Hélène is not here,” He told her once more. “So, what is it that you came for?”

“She was, uh, quite hysterical when she visited last,” Sonya explained, taking little notice of the surprise and then curiosity on Dolokhov’s face. “Marya did not say why but it looked quite severe.”

“I know that she has friend and family in Petersburg,” She continued in a kind of nervous rush. “And well, Natasha’s brother wrote from there last and-“

“There is a war going on,” He finished. “You are worried.”

“Yes.”

“There is no bad news from Petersburg,” He stated and then when looked like she was going to protest, “There is no new news of the French or the war, you have my word as an officer. Hélène is…prone to rash reactions. All Kuragins are, she was likely overreacting.”

“Overreacting is hardly justification for such a volatile reaction,” She shushed. “I saw her _hit_ Count Bezukhov. She said that she hated him, her husband! That is more than an overreacting, she was _hurt_.”

Dolokhov sighed, looked to the stairs and wished that Sonya would go, “You have heard of the whereabouts of her brother?”

“Yes, yes, it is said that he is in Petersburg, that is why I-“

“It was Pierre that ran him there,” He stated, it was a lie and Dolokhov had never been too good at it, never felt the need to learn to lie when the truth was much more damning and harsh. “Hélène is not happy with the arrangement.”

“It was simply a squabble, I assume,” He said and tried to smile. She did not return it, her face pulled down into a frown. “All is well, now, Sonya, and the war is far from us.”

“I wish to believe you, Mr. Dolokhov,” She told him formally. “You have such honor but you befriended a dis-“

“ _Don’t_ ,” He told her, warning her and she tensed. “It is Hélène that lives in this house, do not throw insult onto her family’s name.”

“I – I apologize,” Sonya replied. She did not mean it and they both knew it. “How do I know that you are truthful?”

“What reason do I have not to be?”

She thought for a moment and then bowed her head as if to agree with him, “If you hear of dangers in Moscow would you tell me? I am young, I know, but my heart is strong enough to take it.”

“I will write to you if I hear anything,” He promised her. “I will tell Hélène of your visit.”

“No, don’t,” She signed. “Marya does not know I am here and I wish for it to remain that way. She will not be happy about it.”

He felt his lip turn up and huff something like a laugh, “No, I cannot imagine that she would.”

“Sonya Rostova,” He said softly, leading her to the door with a gentle hand on her arm. “You are too good and Marya is right, do not come back here.”

“Mr. Dolo-“

“Fedya,” He corrected her. “You can call me Fedya but do not return. Thanks again for the pie.”

He closed the door and watched through the glass as she pulled her coat tighter around herself and got into her troika. He did not stop watching until it pulled away and he wondered briefly if he and Hélène were doing anything right.

“Is that your Natalie, mon cher?”

Dolokhov tensed and he turned stiffly, eyes searching until they landed on Anatole sitting at the top of the stairs. He looked down at him with expectant of an answer so Dolokhov responded, “I have no Natalie, I told you that.”

“She seems…nice.”

“She is not your type.”

“Is she yours?” He asked. “She appears respectable, your mother would love that.”

“Do not speak of my mother, Anatole,” Dolokhov sighed before taking the stairs two at a time. “What are you doing? Did you not learn your lessons from last time?”

“I heard voices,” He answered, letting Dolokhov pull him back onto his feet and lead him back to his room with a fight. “I only wished to see who was here. Did she have pie?”


	15. Chapter 15

The night passed into lighter skies and a red sun broke over the horizon by the time Hélène arrive back to the manor, drunk and not alone.

A man, no, a boy was with her. It had to be a boy, just barely old enough to understand why it was he shouldn’t be involved with a girl like Hélène and just young enough to not give a damn. A boy, with hair a white blond downy fluff like baby chicks and eyes drunk and deep hazy blue, with his hands on her hips and slipping lower, mouth on her neck, and reveling in all of Hélène’s half-finished lusty French words.

The door was unlocked after many failed attempts with blind hands in low light and lips met each other in the doorway. Hélène’s keys slipped from her hand, crashing the silence to the floor with it, buttons were undone in the winter night winds and dresses hiked up passed the knee.

Dolokhov cocked his gun in the shadows and they froze.

Dolokhov stepped into the light and leveled his gun. The boy stepped away from the countess, the satin of her dress wrinkled and ruined. Her lipstick on his lips, and neck, and collar. There was a ring shining and gold on his finger.

Dolokhov raised his hand, wiggled four fingers to him in a manner almost more threatening than the gun. He stated simply in a calm even voice, “Go.”

“No,” Hélène replied, grabbing the boy by the arm and purring to him. “Do not listen to him, there is nothing for him to hurt but his own pride. The night may be over but the morning is young, mon cher.”

“Fedya Dolokhov, he – he killed the Shah’s brother.”

“And I have no qualms about adding you to the list, go.”

“Fyodor,” Hélène hissed, sending him a vicious look. Dolokhov’s gun didn’t waiver even as he met her eyes, he did not appear to have been roused from sleep so he had been waiting. That annoyed her more than she thought it should. “What care do we have for the Shah and who killed his brother, it is the past. Leave it there and let’s – let us live in this moment.”

“I did not-“ The boy stuttered hopelessly, having not registered anything Hélène had said. She rolled her eyes to it. “I did not mean any disrespect, I did not know that you and the Countess were-“

“Go,” Dolokhov told him, it was not a suggestion and he did not correct the assumption made. It was better that they believed what they thought his and Hélène’s relationship was, Dolokhov knew that he could reason that because Hélène had done the same to him. “I will shoot.”

The boy went pale and Hélène sighed, “He won’t kill you.”

“No, no, the Countess is correct in that assumption,” Dolokhov said, taking a step forward as the boy took a step back. He lowered his gun a fraction of an inch. “Kill you, I will not.”

“Oh, I thank-“

“But an amputated leg is a bitch, I hear,” Dolokhov continued, gun steady and an odd and sinister smile creeping onto his face. “Now be off, I am sure that your _wife_ is worried, _kid_.”

The boy nodded once, a blush flush on his face, and did not meet Hélène’s eyes as he turned and practically ran from the Bezukhov manor. Hélène let the door slam shut behind her, eyes an angry drunk fire, “Fedya, what is the meaning of this?”

“What is the meaning of this?” He asked back incredulous. “Have you gone mad, you were to bring somebody into this house? And then what, allow them to roam the premises?”

“That was not my intention with the boy, you are aware of that.”

“Yes, I am aware of your _intentions_ , Hélène,” He sat his gun down hard on the table before picking of her keys and sitting them down just as hard. “Are you aware that just because you presume to think that you can control every outcome that you don’t actually possess that ability? No one does. You do not have a clue what that could have lead, how it could have ended.”

She huffed, crossing her arms over her chest, “I am smarter than you, Dolokhov.”

“What if he had found Anatole?” He asked in a hiss. “What if he _laughed_ in his face, that is what you are afraid of, yes? Your brother being a joke. What if he ran off and told the whole town of the lies you dug us into. Then what, Hélène?”

“That would not have happened,” She answered stiffly. “I would not have allowed it to ever come to that.”

“The world does not work under your control.”

“Yes,” She hissed, in a burst of satin and movement she brushed passed him and stalked up the stairs. “It does.”

“You cannot fathom the way I view this world,” She stated. “You do not see it the way I do, see all the strings to pluck and pull. I understand people better than you, I know how to use them. Do not try to understand it, _Fedya_ , you do not have the _ability_.”

“I have the ability to see through your act, to see that you have no idea what it is you’re doing,” He replied, voice harsh and sarcastic as he followed behind her. “That you use your influence and manipulation to get what you want from me, from your brother, from everybody. I see it, Hélène, it is no secret to me.”

“Then you should know that there was no danger in bringing him here,” She stated, turning at the landing. The glass of the broken bottle still there and crushed beneath their boots but the vodka had long since dried.

“You think you’re clever, so clever,” He shook his head. “Society tells you that you are but it’s all high society and they are just as delusional. You are just as much a spoiled child as your brother.”

“That is the same society that thinks you are fierce,” She snapped. “But you’re not. I see the way you shake, the terrors in your nights slept. I see your love-sick hopelessness and the way your heart crumbles at each of Anatole’s lovers. You’re a fraud, Dolokhov.”

“As are you, _princess_.”

“I am the one that has to salvage my family name,” She stated. “That has to protect Anatole’s damned reputation and keep all the stories straight. It is a responsibility onto myself and I will do it but allow me my fun.”

“Not at the cost of your brother.”

“There was no cost,” She snapped. “Anatole is my concern, my _top_ concern. I love him more than you think that you do so do not – _do not_ tell me how I should care for my brother. I care with my whole heart and always have, always will. Do not insult me, Dolokhov.”

“You are drunk and you will not see reason.”

“Because there is no reason left for me to see, I know all of it.”

“Anatole asked for you,” He stated when she turned to leave. Hélène froze, tense in a moment before pulling together her calm composure that did not work on him. “He asked of your whereabouts and I told him that you were not here.”

“Anatole is angry with me, he would not be asking of me.”

“He did,” Dolokhov insisted. “He did not vocalize it but I imagine that he was upset that you were not there. He was asleep last I checked, that is your next question, correct?”

She clenched her teeth shut and then turned on her heels, she turned down the hall to Anatole’s room only to pause at the door. She looked back to Dolokhov and asked, “And you, were you asleep?”

“I was waiting for your return.”

“What is your reasoning?”

“I wanted assurance that you made it home safe,” He answered. “Despite my harsh words, I care for you, Hélène.”

She nodded sharply, “Could not sleep then?”

“Not a wink.”

“Is there a reason for it or is it restlessness?” She asked curiously. “I know that Anatole suffers thoughts of the war at times and I am aware that you do as well, is that-“

“He does not remember Natasha, it has kept me from sleep.”

She removed her hand from the doorknob, “What?”

“We were in his study, there are letters,” He explained. “Uh, drafts that he was not pleased with when courting her. He thought – he thought they were mine, he does not remember Natasha.”

“At all?”

“As far as I can tell.”

Dolokhov watched her critically but Hélène gave nothing for him to watch as she did not move, her eyes the same drunk haze and her mouth a thin line. Then she shrugged her plump shoulders, “It is probably best that way.”

“Hélène-“

“I believe my brother did love that girl,” She said softly. “Different from the others that he has thought he loved and he wanted to see her that night, ready to run off into the snow for her.”

“It nearly cost him his life, this is better,” She added, “God has not abandoned us all at once, it appears.”

“It seems like cruel fate.”

“Life is cruel,” She stated plainly. “I protect him as much I can but I cannot from everything. This is his mind doing it for me, like the unremembered trauma, yes?”

Dolokhov frowned, “I – I suppose you could view it as such.”

“And I do,” She hummed. “I wish to sleep, let me see my brother before I am off.”

The only part of Anatole visible when the door was finally pushed open was one pale leg from under a mountain of new bedding and old. The bruise Dolokhov had anticipated blossomed across his knee in a display of black and blue, Hélène paused in the doorway and before stepping farther into the room, “What is this?”

“A bruise.”

“Obviously, Dolokhov, it is new. Where did it come from?”

“He fell in the hall,” Dolokhov answered. “It was more surprising and then painful, he was not hurt.”

Hélène listened as she extracted the heavy wool and silk sheets with practiced care until she found the rest of her brother. She observed his sleeping fact, looking for any sign of farther injury, content when she found none, “It was just his knees?”

“His hands but there was not further injury.”

“He keeps getting hurt around you,” She noticed, carding her fingers through where his hair went flat against his head and readjusting the skewed bandages.

There was heavy implication in her voice and Dolokhov gritted his teeth, “I am not the cause of it, he would not accept my help.”

“And you do everything Anatole wishes of you, yes?” She asked, her voice was too light to not be fake. “That is how we ended up here, isn’t it?”

“I told you that I am not at fault for this injury, Countess.”

“Yes, I am aware that is what you said because I remember that you placed that burden and guilt upon my shoulders.”

The lightness was gone and Hélène’s voice was like a cold Russian winter, her eyes a fire as she settled onto the bed with Anatole’s head in her lap. Dolokhov crossed his arms to hide his clenched fists, “I did not blame you for his injuries, I pointed out your irritational behavior afterwards.”

“That is not the way I remember it.”

“Because you are conceited like all Kuragins and you view the world through a lens in which you are always right,” He stated. “It is a dig at my character and my loyalty to _my_ friend that you are placing blame on me for injury that occurred when I was not here.”

“You did not stop his ridiculous plan,” She stated harshly. “You are a soldier, an officer, a strategist for war and battle and you did not do anything to stop what you knew would fail.”

“I did not _fund_ it!” He snapped. “Anatole will do what it is that he wants, I went along to make sure that he did not get himself killed and he didn’t. He came here and you _allowed_ -“

They both broke off into a sharp hiss and Hélène’s hand froze from carding Anatole’s hair when a pained whine crawled from his lips and he curled away from her. Her eyes furrowed, “Anatole?”

There was another whine and his hands cupped his ears but no real acknowledgement until Hélène tried to pet his hair once more, “Brother, don’t fret. It’s-“

He pushed up and away, glaring somewhere to her right with bleary eyes, “ _No_.”

“Ana-“

“G’way,” He muttered, words short and abrupt as he pulled the blanket up over his head.

Hélène was Hélène and she also drunk, she pulled the blanket back immediately, “Anatole, I wish to speak to you.”

Her wrist was trapped in a tight grip when she reached out to shake him and he let out a sound like a cross between a whine and a growl but did not open his eyes, “ _Stop_.”

“Anatole, you are hurting me.”

He let go of her wrist immediately, throwing it away from him almost violently before pulling the blanket back over his head, “G’way, ‘Lene.”

“No, no, Anatole, come on,” She pouted, poking at him through the sheet. “I know that it is early but let’s have fun! We never have fun anymore.”

Anatole had never been an early riser, the joys of the morning was something that alluded him for as long as Dolokhov knew him. He was cranky and whiny but even this was to a new degree when he swatted Hélène’s hand away from him with a groan.

She ruffled his hair and he cried out, “ _Staph_.”

“Anatole?” She asked, a cross of curiosity and concern in her voice. When she got no response, she sighed unhappily and then nudged him, “Fine, sleep. Scoot over.”

“No,” Anatole grumbled. “G’way, Hélène.”

“Listen to him, Hélène.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, _Dolokhov_ ,” She scoffed but gathered herself and climbed off the bed. She looked hurt in a way she could not hide with the alcohol in her system. “I am going, Anatole.”

She got no response and Dolokhov knew it bothered her.

He eased the door shut after she walked through it and followed her, “He is tired, Hélène.”

“I told you that he was still angry with me,” She snapped, throwing her hands into the air. “You said that he asked for me.”

“He did.”

“Was it because he wanted me out of his life forever?” She asked sarcastically. “It is ridiculous, I am just trying to help him. It is not my fault that he is unhappy with himself.”

“You did call him broken.”

“He _is_ ,” She hissed. “It is my fault, Dolokhov, it is, okay? I invited the Rostova girl to the ball for my own amusement, I gave him the money, I let him go into Pierre’s study.”

“It isn’t-“

“It is both our faults,” She stated, rubbing at her eye. Hélène was a Kuragin, blame was for somebody else’s or all of them, she would never bear it alone. “It is _his_ fault, the fool. Anatole should know better by now.”

He nodded, pressing his lips into a frown because, yes, they played a role in this downfall but, “It is Pierre’s fault, Hélène, he was the one to clench his fist.”

“I hate him,” She said, scrubbing at her eyes hard enough that the makeup smeared. “I hate Pierre so much and his stupid sad face. I spoke with him tonight, he told that he’d grand me a divorce if it was my desire.”

“Did you-“

“No,” She shook her head. “It would bring shame onto me and my father would hear of it, he would come. I know you think that I am awful but I just want to protect Anatole, to keep his naïve soul from harsh words and harsher judgement. Our father would judge.”

“I understand your reasoning,” He told her. “I don’t approve of the execution. You told people that he _died_ , you kept important information from your father who has a right to know of his son, and you – you are holding onto this hope that he will suddenly be ‘fixed’ so he holds on too.”

“It is damaging,” Dolokhov stated softly. “For the both of you, it is cruel to do.”

“But – but I want him back,” She told him. “It was never this hard before.”

“It will get better, Hélène, I promise that.”

She sighed, smearing her makeup farther and then held out her hand to him, “I do not wish to sleep alone tonight, Fedya, please.”

He nodded and took her hand. 


	16. Chapter 16

“Where were you?”

Dolokhov felt his spine stiffen despite himself and the hair on the back of his neck stand on end as he eased the door shut against the wind behind him. He removed his snow-saturated coat in a mechanical manner, forcing himself to go through the motions but he did not address the question in any vocal form until it was asked again, “Was it into town?”

He met Hélène’s eyes squinting miserably from the shadow of high arching doorways, makeup smeared and face pinched in an awful hangover pain. He answered simply, “I was out.”

She pressed her lips together, unpleased with that answer and tapped on the glass of water held in her hands before taking a sip. She sat it down on a table just to cross her arms over yesterday’s dress and asked with a sneer, “Have you found yourself a slut to entertain your needs?”

“Just the one I am with now.”

The air hung thick between them as her eyes narrowed even further and he stared back blankly, expectantly, until her face broke into a smirk, “Anatole would have your head if he heard you say such a thing to me.”

His face cracked too and he chucked under his breath as the thick atmosphere dissipated into something airy, light, and familiar. He shook his head, “Are you sure that he would not agree with me?”

The startled bark of laughter that escaped Hélène’s throat hurt her head and the disbelieving headshake did not help, “He would never, my dear brother has always seen me for my best. He would kill you for such words.”

“Kill me with sheer annoyance surely, you mean?” He chuckled. “Then yes, I suppose he might try.”

“There are no secrets between us and my brother still believes that I am a woman of high honor,” She noted, covering the laugh in her voice with a sip from her glass. “I believe he has no concept of what honor truly is.”

“He believes too that I am an honorable man,” He said, bowing dramatically in Anatole’s prince-like fashion. “That castle in the clouds where he sticks his head must be a wonderful place to be able to see honor in a dastardly assassin and a slut.”

“Call me a slut again, Dolokhov, in front of my Anatole, I implore you,” She said in a challenge with a smile but the smile fell slightly. “I am sure that he would love again in his anger for your words.”

His smile dropped as well and he avoided the way her face fell by kicking off his snowy boots. It felt almost hollow to repeat for the hundredth time that Anatole did not hate her, that he couldn’t. The words felt stale and meaningless now.

She asked in a softer, curious voice, “Did you go threaten that man?”

“The boy from this morning? No.”

“Then, where were you?” She questioned. ‘You have no left this house since Anatole was unconscious and hurt, and suddenly you do. It is most suspicious.”

“Maybe I was taking a walk, feeding the horses.”

“You could have,” She hummed, intrigue winning over the pain of hangover and her sensitive eyes as she stepped into the light filtering in through the door’s glass panes. She observed him critically, “But you weren’t.”

“You look tense,” She continued, eying him in a way that made him straighten his shoulders and standing taller, his hands crossed at the wrist behind his back. “Your side of the bed was cold to the touch upon my waking, you have been gone for a long time, my friend, and it is frigid outside. If you were walking then you would have frozen through by now.”

“There is fire in your heart,” She noted, picking lint from his shoulder. “A fierceness in your eyes that I have not seen in a long time.”

She was not asking anymore, picking him to pieces the way one would an old timepiece when they were curious about how it worked. She would not stop until there was nothing left to pick at so he gave in, “I went to speak with my mother.”

“Liar, you adore that woman more than life itself,” She replied. “You would not be angry, she makes you happy.”

“I am sending her away, I don’t wish to discuss it.”

“What?”

Hélène reeled back, shock coloring her voice and her face, and she looked at him with question and demand for answer. She did not voice her questions but they took up a pressing tangible presence in the room.

“She does not move as she once did, tires easily and her bones old, and my sister does not deserve the burden of an entire household upon her shoulders,” He said in a monotonous voice, void of emotion as if it was just simple fact. “I cannot look after them as much as I wish to so I am sending them to an uncle of menial wealth in Petersburg, I have worked out the correspondence with him a week ago. Everything is set.”

“You can’t – it is because of us,” She realized softly. “Fedya, you will be miserable without her near. You cannot send her off because you have dedicated your time to myself and my brother.”

“It is a choice of my own, Hélène, not anybody else’s.”

“Made because of a stupid oath you made to my brother,” She stated, stressing how dumb she thought it was. “Family is of importance, Fedya, a greater importance than war-time oaths or loyalty to an airhead prince. I cannot allow you to ship off your family for my own.”

“I will not leave Anatole in the state that he is in,” Dolokhov said with finality. “He will believe that I have abandoned him for his afflictions and I cannot bear to that ill thought on my mind.”

“We have disagreed on many issues when it comes to him, Hélène, but we can agree that he would believe that,” He added. “I don’t fault you for your investment in your brother and the way your heart clouds your mind when it comes to what is best but my mind remains level when it is needed and Anatole needs that from me. I will not leave.”

“Then your family shall stay here, we have the room.”

“No.”

“Fed-“

“What would the people say?” He asked. “They would assume that I cannot afford to keep my dear angel mother under a roof, that I am suffering monetarily, that I am a lover to you even more than they already think so.”

“This is what is for the best,” He said, more to himself than to her. “She does not agree at this moment but she is wise beyond her years and she will see that I am right. When Anatole is healthy once more then I will bring my mother back.”

“Allow me to pay the way then,” Hélène offered sincerely. “It is the least I can do.”

Dolokhov was proud, too proud in the way that men who did not believe their worth were, and he would not accept her money or her apologies, or any alternative she came up with. And he didn’t, he took a deep breath, shook the tension from his shoulders, and offer her a smile so boyish and sweet that he lost half his age with it, “Has Anatole woke for the day?”

“He was asleep when I checked, my heart cannot take waking him and being shunned again so I have let him sleep,” She sighed. “You are free to check or you may join me as I speak with the cooks about dinner and the preparations of breakfast.”

“It is too late for breakfast,” Dolokhov noted. “The sun has traveled half the sky.”

“Lunch then, mon cher,” She hummed, offering her arm. He took it, looping it within his own. “Care to join me?”

“As you wish, princess.”

 

It was Hélène’s non-to-gentle suggestion over their late breakfast/lunch that it might be better if it was he who took Anatole the horrid vitamin protein concoction the doctor prescribed he drink with every meal, so Dolokhov did.

She was avoiding Anatole, the sting of his words and the refusal to his bed had hurt her more than she could pretend that it didn’t. Dolokhov understood it, understood on a level deep within his soul how difficult all of this had been on her and he understood all the ways that Kuragins protected their own hearts.

Anatole lashed out, childish in the acts and his inability to see passed himself to how he hurt those around him. He pouted, sulked, he did things with stupid consequences as revenge. He did not listen, he did opposite of what you asked of him despite it being against his own best interest. Anatole a fool, and a child, and opposite of his sister.

Hélène buried herself in tedious tasks and decadence until her heart was mended. She snapped in short burst and buried herself in her cold expressions. She avoided that which she did not like until she knew all the ways to manipulate and mold it into something favorable to herself.

Anatole would sulk and pout, Hélène would plan, and they both would long for each other’s forgiveness but they would not offer their own.

Anatole’s breakfast remained untouched, still on its tray at the table when Dolokhov entered the room. The curtains only half drawn and the candles burnt down to nothing. He was curled up near the top of the bed with his back to the headboard, only a hand visible in the slit of illuminated sunlight.

Dolokhov sat the tray of lunch that he brought and the drink onto the table, next to breakfast’s congealed eggs and stale toast and the forgotten soup from the day before, and he made work of pulling the pillows from the bed. He pulled back the heavy furs and silk sheets to the prince beneath them and shook him by the shoulder, “Rise and shine, Anatole, your breakfast has gone cold.”

Anatole groaned, tried and failed to bat anywhere near where Dolokhov’s hand was. It was not until he was pulled into a seated position and his face tapped multiple times that Anatole opened his eyes at all.

They were bleary with sleep and unfocused with disgruntle annoyance but he said nothing as Dolokhov maneuvered his hands around the glass and held them there, “Drink this.”

Anatole hummed, blinking slowly with his head resting on his shoulder but made no notion of having understood a word said to him.

Dolokhov, content that Anatole could handle the menial task of drinking from a cup, moved about the room to grab the tray of food. He had to jump back to the bed when Anatole attempted to sit the glass on the table with both hands and nearly sat it on thin air an inch away for it. He grabbed the glass before too much of its content could spill onto the floor, easing it back into Anatole laxed grip, “Whoa, no, you need to drink it.”

“I know that it is gross,” He continued, grabbing a fistful of Anatole’s tunic when he tried to lay back down. “You need to drink it or you’ll waste away.”

Anatole nodded. It meant nothing.

Dolokhov squeezed Anatole’s hands around the glass to get his attention and told him that he was going to let go multiple times before hesitantly doing so. The cup had already started tilting dangerously, “Anatole, can you hold the glass?”

“Anatole,” He said again, “Hold the glass.”

“Anatole?”

Dolokhov took the glass from hands barely holding it and sat it on the table with a loud thud. He felt a frustration rise within him and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Anatole.”

There was no response, just hands dropping into a blanketed lap, spasming and shaking, and Anatole’s slowly blinking eyes struggling to meet his own in the room. He looked exhausted, a terrifying hollowness to his eyes hollower than his cheeks and Dolokhov lost whatever frustration he had at the look of them.

“I’m sorry,” He sighed, trying and failing not to look at the pale slender hands. He picked up the glass and fiddled with it for a moment before sighing once more, “Allow me to help you, Anatole, will you do that?”

The only response he got was another slow blink and Anatole slumping against the headboard in a manner most unprincely. Dolokhov felt sad.

He was gentle when he lifted Anatole’s chin and pressed the glass to his lips, “Drink, prince, you must.”

Dolokhov did not know if this was Anatole being difficult or if he was just too tired to comply with such a simple task but he found himself cleaning thick porridge-like drink from the top blanket on the bed. He found himself trying and failing to pull Anatole from a soiled shirt, found himself frustrated with himself and the prince who drank little and allowed the drink to pour down his chin with little registration. He felt frustrated.

“You’re a pain in the ass,” He grumbled when Anatole clumsily swatted at his hands as they manhandled him from his shirt and pulled the top blanket from the bed.

“You’re doing this on purpose,” He accused as he used the soiled shirt to clean his face and Anatole whined like a child. “You’re trying to make me feel guilty.”

“I won’t feel guilty,” He told him and Anatole grumbled something slurred, unintelligible, and irrelevant about sleep and slid sideways half in his shirt until he was horizontal at a terrible angle. He reached blindly for a blanket that was not there but gave up on finding it.

Fedya found himself sighing at the sight and pulling the blanket up to his chin, tucking it around Anatole’s thin shoulders. He sighed sadly.

It was the reason he could not allow himself to leave, this. He could allow himself to even entertain the thought of it. He could not, or he would not, put the feeling into words. The heartache that pained him, the fear that flooded him, the sadness that _was_ him. He could not explain to his mother or to Hélène why it was that he had to stay.

It was not oath-bound, it was not war-time camaraderie or anything he felt he _owed_ Anatole. It was a deeper feeling, too deep and big and encompassing to put into words. It was Anatole.

There was loss and then there was what Anatole was, and the longing for what Anatole used to be and the guilt for wanting that back exhausted him to too many degrees and it hung to him like a heavy fur coat. He owed it to his friend to remain, owed it to his heart and the too big feelings.

“Do you want me to stay?” He asked, not knowing if he meant in the room, the manor, Moscow but Anatole flinched at the sudden words and burrowed beneath the blankets without word.

Dolokhov nodded to himself and he told Anatole that he would take his leave, “Call, it is all you have to do if you want company.”

He got no response.

Dolokhov wandered, feeling lose and useless with a skin-crawling need to just _do_ something with meaning to it. There was an almost nervous abundance of energy climbing his veins and infecting his mind and heart, he found himself pacing without thought. He found himself bored.

He’d find himself in the kitchen, his feet taking him there with no notion of thought to drive them, watching Hélène’s harsh reign as she micromanaged the kitchen staff about perfect meal in which her entire mental wellbeing balanced on. He found himself standing outside Anatole’s door, looking in at the pile of blankets and the prince beneath them, on them, tangled in sheets. He found himself useless for the first time in his life.

He found himself at the front door, hand on the handle, and ready to leave.

He found himself lost.

For as long as he has been, he has had a purpose to fulfill. He was the dutiful son, the helpful and protective brother, the partner in crime to a troublesome prince. He was the solider, the infantry, the assassin, the caretaker.

He found himself weaponless and unable to protect the one he held so dear. He found himself unhelpful and unknowing how to be because he couldn’t fix Anatole’s shaking hands or his broken eye, he could not mend the slur in his words or his wobbling knees, he could not give him back the skill and precision it took to play the violin or repair Hélène’s broken heart. He could not take away her guilt.

The fires of angry fury that burnt through his was gone, dimmed and dying into smoldering nothingness. Winter’s cold hopelessness had settled in and Dolokhov did not know what to do.

It was his fourth visit to Anatole’s door, the entire manor a warmth and homey feeling with the scents of rising bread and cooked meat, that Dolokhov noticed that something was not quite right. It was the sixth visit that he realized what it was.

Anatole didn’t snore.

Anatole did not snore but he wheezed, a slight whistle of breath through his teeth and the ever-present movement of tireless legs. Anatole now, in the silence of the room broken only by the relentless squawking of the random duck in the courtyard, was not asleep.

“Anatole?”

No response.

“I know that you are awake.” When the silence stretched longer between them and did not shatter once, Dolokhov rolled his eyes and frowned, “This is a new level of immaturity, even for you.”

“You cannot hide away in your room under the guise of sleep because you do not wish to face your sister or myself,” He continued, met with only the slightest shift of the blankets and the pillow pulled out from under Anatole’s head and pressed over it. “You are not even good at faking it.”

He found himself struck with an irrational sort of offense that Anatole thought he would be so easily tricked, found himself stomping across the room. He paused, his stocking-covered foot coming in contact with something wet and thick, sopping through the heavy fabric to his flesh.

He hissed in disgust.

It took Dolokhov a moment, more than a moment to see through his irritation enough to realize that the something not quite right was something _wrong_ , “Anatole, were you sick?”

He called to Anatole again as he removed his ruined socks with a disgust that could not be matched and tossed something over the bile and regurgitated protein/vitamin drink on the floor for it to be cleaned later. He pulled the blanket back and saw the flinch that curled shoulders inward and squeezed eyes shut, and he did not realize it for what it was when he barked like a solider would make demands.

A cry tore from Anatole’s mouth and it startled Dolokhov from his anger. He stood still and confused as Anatole clutched his head in his hands, his fingernails digging into the skin. His voice was pain-laced when he spat out just one word, “Hurts.”

“Your – your head?” Dolokhov’s voice was soft and confused but Anatole still flinched at it. “Anatole, what is wrong?”

He sounded more insistent, more panicked, tears gathering in the corners of his closed eyes and falling from his eyelashes. His voice was pitifully broken, _“hurts.”_

“You have a headache?” He whispered, reaching to comfort but pulling his hand back for fear of making matters worse. It seemed worse than a headache, it was, “Anatole, you are experiencing a migraine.”

“Staph,” Anatole pleaded, his words tripping over each other in tangible pain. “M’ke ‘t staph.”

“I-“ Dolokhov did not stop himself this time, trying to comfort him. He ran his fingers through Anatole’s hair and was returned with a pathetic whine and more crying. He pulled his hand away, “I’m sorry, I –“

“I don’t know what to do,” Dolokhov admitted in a whisper so small it was almost nothing. He felt a burning behind his eyes. “Have you – food, you should eat-“

Anatole whined, a queasy look passed his face and he reached for the blankets, “Bright.”

Dolokhov closed the curtains and came back to the bed only to realize that he did not know what to do. Standing awkwardly with his hands scratching nervously at his beard, “What can I do, Anatole?”

A sob shook Anatole violently as he pressed his hands against his temples and Dolokhov felt his composer crack but was finally given a task when Anatole asked, “Hélène?”

“You want her?”

Another sob shook him and he pleaded, “Want Hélène.”

Dolokhov all but rushed from the room, easing the door shut behind him without a sound and walking to the end of the hall before he took off in a sprint. He went to the kitchen and demanded her whereabouts, “I do not know, Mr. Dolokhov, she took her leave some time ago.”

“Where did she-“

“She did not say.”

He scrubbed at his beard, tugging on it nervously as he took the stairs two at a time to her room, only to find it empty. He searched the drawing room, every study in the house, rooms he’d never been in before and he came up empty, frustrated and tired.

“She is not here, Anatole, I do not know where she has gone.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Am I setting up an actual sequel to I Pity You, I Pity Me and does it require that Dolokhov's mother be in Petersburg? Maybe. 
> 
> I am a migraine suffer so Anatole is a migraine suffer. I am straight up useless right before, during, and after a bad migraine and nothing clicks or registers well with me so I kind of upped that sentiment with Anatole since he's also recovering from a head injury.
> 
> And I have not forgotten about the dinner!


	17. Chapter 17

There was word in Moscow that Fedya Dolokhov walked the streets.

It was a simple fact among the gossips and the busybodies that spread among them in whispered wildfire, whispery words that started and abruptly stopped when Pierre went by. They never waited long for him to get far enough before starting up again.

Dolokhov was in Moscow, he had been spotted that very morning walking the cobblestones between his modest home and the Bezukhov manor. It was all the evidence they needed for their unfound confirmation that Dolokhov must have aided in Anatole’s escape to Petersburg and had now since returned.

Dolokhov was back because he never left, it was a fact known only to Pierre, a fact that comforted him little and gnawed angrily at indignity and jealousy until they were red, and bleeding, and infectious to his blood but it was fact nonetheless. One could not go around being angry at facts or else they would surely go mad.

Whispers circled around Pierre’s ears of the new lines of bony-wary tiredness that hung on his face and an animalistic growl in his short-temperedness. People avoided Dolokhov on his walk, they crossed the street and their whispering ceased.

It was said that he was making preparations in order to send his dear mother and his disadvantaged sister off to Petersburg next to stay with an uncle or maybe even the Kuragins. It was said that he took residence in the Bezukhov manor upon his return.

Pierre ignored it.

Hélène’s tears of that night and her unnatural sobs as she grew bloody and pleading, her crumbling face and her hollow words in Marya’s front hall – _Anatole has passed_ – made the world feel too bright, and harsh, and _much_.

He had no tolerance for it any longer.

Mostly, he stayed in.

He drank too much, and read until the pages blurred, and he tried to forget what his hands had done, what he had done. He drowned in his guilt until Hélène’s words were nothing more than a faraway slur.

He had fell into a guilt-ridden depression following Hélène’s words in Marya’s front hall and he pulled himself from it only on occasion, pulled himself out of bed, out of days-out clothes and trimmed his bear to be presentable in public. He would leave when he needed.

He left to buy paper, and booze, and sometimes he’d bear the marketplace with Marya but he stopped seeing Natasha. He had been told that she was getting better, her weakness leaving her as he fell into a despair he was unable to crawl out of.

He would go to the market if needed, to the shops, walk out halfway to the manor with apologizes and pleads for forgiveness on his tongue and turn around. He would go to the club when he needed any distraction from the hellish screaming in his ears. To the club, where he ran into Hélène and she broke his heart, and destroyed any spirit in him, where she brought the screaming to the front of his skull but gave him a task, a purpose.

The sun was falling in the sky, passing midday and entering the orangey afternoon brightness, and Pierre paced.

To and fro, to and fro, to and fro, with the wooden boards beneath his feet creaking with every step across the length of the front porch. He would stop at the door, raise his hand to knock and then a cold dread would overcome him, colder than the winds wiping at his face, and he drop the limb to his side.

He would pace.

Lost in his thoughts, in his guilt, fiddling with the repaired bow he carried under his fur coat so not to get covered with falling snow. He sighed, paused, failed to knock, and pace in a maddening manner.

He was startled from his thoughts of leaving the bow and fleeing by the door pulling open. He had almost expected to find Dolokhov there, a gun out and ready to shoot, he found Hélène instead.

She looked unimpressed and annoyed, “I told you not to come here.”

“I, uh, I was – I just wanted to-“ He sighed, unable to command his hands to pull the bow from his jacket and unable to communicate that he brought it. “You look well, Hélène.”

“I’m not.”

“It smells lovely, have I interrupted dinner?”

“No,” She stated plainly, crossing her arms. “You are not to be joining me for it.”

“I am not that presumptuous to think that I was.”

“I won’t allow you through the door,” She told him. “If you wish to bother me then go.”

“That is not my intention.”

“You are failing in your objective then,” She sighed, rolling her eyes. “Why are you here?”

Finally getting control of his limbs, Pierre pulled the bow from his jacket and offered it to her, “I paid a hefty fee for it be finished as quickly as possible. I know that it is of immense value to you.”

Her face softened a fraction and she took the bow carefully in her hands. She looked into the house and sighed before placing it on a near table, “I thank you. Now you can go.”

“Hélène, I-“

She sighed again, loud and annoyed, and rolled her eyes before closing the door. Pierre sighed to himself and turned on his heels to leave, only to pause with the door was pulled back open and Hélène was bundling in her coat.

“I won’t allow you inside,” She said. “But you clearly wish to discuss something so I will allow you to take me on a walk. Go.”

When he did not move immediately, she shooed him, “Walk, Pierre, or I will change my mind.”

Pierre was not unused to Hélène’s silence. It was a constant in their marriage, her silence, her judgment, the way she looked to him as if there was nothing much to look at.

She had liked him once.

Before the talks of marriage, before arrangements were made, and he was something more than just the chain binding her to the duties of a wedded woman, she had liked him. He liked to think that she did.

They met in the drawing room at one Anna Pavlovna’s parties in the days before Pierre’s father’s illness took him beyond any hope of return. He saw a beautiful girl making conversation with such ease and grace, and a laugh so charming and light, and she had smiled to him. He had offered a small awkward smile back.

He did not remember what led to him sitting among a small group near the fire in overstuffed and garnished chairs, speaking and unable to get himself to stop speaking of the war, and politics, and Napoleon. He did not remember what possessed Anatole Kuragin to seek him out and listen with his head tilted down and his eyes blank and thoughtless, but he remembered the sweeping of light summer colors and a drink presented to himself and her brother.

He remembered the grace and refined elegance in her movement as she took up residence on the arm of Anatole chair, and listened, and offered little as way of conversation until she did. She prompted his meaning to his opinion on the war efforts, challenged them because she disagreed, and she did not backdown after his initial assumption that she, as a woman, would know little on the matter.

He remembered how she challenged him with laugh in her voice and a passionate fire behind her eyes, “And just what is it that you know that I wouldn’t, dear Pierre? Neither of us serve.”

He remembered Anatole’s amused smirk and the way Hélène’s smile in her winning. And he remembered the way he thought that he loved a smart and clever woman, loved the challenge, and did not feel any shame in his apology, “I suppose that you are right, Princess, do forgive me.”

She had never searched for him but she never seemed annoyed or disappointed on coming across him in the midst of the trouble Anatole often dragged him into. Her eyes were light and bright, and happy, and then they were married and all that dimmed into a hate.

The pain of it dulled into a hate of his own, a discontent for the woman and the deception of her cleverness. He did not love her and she would never love him, but Pierre worried.

She looked tired, a certain kind of haggardness hung to her despite her beautiful face and her extravagant fur cloak. He fiddled with his buttons and then sighed.

“If you wish to say something, then say it,” She said suddenly, eyes looking ahead over the snowy landscape of the courtyard and the barn in the distance.

“I am plagued with thoughts of you doing something dramatic,” He finally said, he copied her and looked ahead of them. It felt easier to speak that way. “It is haunting my thoughts.”

“I am a Kuragin, we are known for our theatrics.”

“That is – something deadly and dangerous,” He shook his head, stopping and looking to her, trying to express what it was that he thought. “I know how close you and your brother are.”

“Most of Moscow thinks they know how close my brother and I are.”

“I fear that you will take drastic measures to cure your sadness,” He spoke. “I fear – after what you told me of your mother, I fear that-“

“That is a ridiculous notion,” She rolled her eyes and starting walking again. “Do not pretend that you care for me, Pierre, it is a shallow and stupid thing for you to do. What is the reason that you are here, the true one?”

He sighed again and fiddled with his buttons and Hélène laughed, something clicking together for her, “Is it Fedya? Are you still jealous of my brother’s _friend_?”

“No.”

“It is, isn’t it?” She said, shaking her head in a disbelieve. “You are a stupid man, Pierre, and I do not need you to protect an honor that you don’t believe I have and you need not worry of indecencies in your house.”

“I-“

“Dolokhov’s heart is broken,” She stated, her voice as cold as the wind and snow wetting his boots. “As is my own, the very last on his mind is bedding me and the ridiculous notion that you have that he was in my bed was unfound and _stupid_. You were wrong.”

“Was I?” He snapped and then breathed out frustrated. “I do not wish to argue, Hélène.”

“You wish to “check” on me, yes?” She asked sarcastically. “Because you are concerned, concern found solely in my mother’s selfish decisions? It was not I that was like her, it was my brother.”

“Is it so hard to believe that I would care for you?” He asked. “You are my wife.”

“Only by ring and title,” She rolled her eyes. “You care as much for me as I for you.”

“When Dolokhov shot at me, I saw your face,” He stated. “I saw the stricken look, I heard you scream.”

“It was an act, a show for the people.”

“For who?” He asked. “All that was there with any matter was ourselves, your brother, and Dolokhov. It is not unfound worry for you, Hélène, and it is no act, I am concerned.”

“Put your mind at ease, Pierre,” She continued, walking ahead of him. “I would not offer the satisfaction of my death to _you_. I many reasons to continue, though I miss all that my brother was.”

“I am sor-“

“I told you not to apologize to me,” She snapped. “It means nothing and it will continue to mean nothing. Have you found the answers in which you were searching for? I am cold and would like to turn back.”

“Yes.”

“Good,” She replied, turning on her heels. She marched passed him but when Pierre did not move, she paused and turned back around. “It is quite a walk back, accompany me?”

“Of course.”

“And you will leave,” She told him when he caught up to her stride. “A civil tongue does not mean that I have forgiven anything that you have done. Understood?”

He sighed sadly, swelling with his guilt and thoughts of too much red, “Yes.”

The silence followed them back as the manor came back into view through the falling snow, and it continued as he walked her to the door, tracking snow upon the porch. He stood almost awkwardly as her hand rested against the handle.

She paused and turned back, something passed over her face, something like uncertainty, something like thought. She sighed, “Dolokhov believes that my actions were cruel and that I must tell you, Anatole is-“

She startled, a gasp pulling from her lips as the door was pulled open from the other side. She blinked, “Dr. Kuznetsov?”

“Ivan?” Pierre echoed the doctor’s name behind her, confusion as ever present in his voice as in hers. “What is it that you are doing here?”

“I…” He trailed off, meeting Hélène’s eyes as they were closers and wilder. “I must be going. It is nice to see, Pierre, you look, uh – well, it has been nice to see you. Countess.”

“Doctor,” She said numbly as a goodbye and almost walked through the door without another word, had Pierre not grabbed her hand. “Let go.”

He loosened his grip but he did not comply, “Hélène, tell me why a doctor was here?”

“It is not for me, you fool,” She snapped, ripping her arm away. She paused for a series of a seconds as she thought and then finally said, “Fedya is not as well as he appears.”

“What?”

“He is staying with me for reasons not what you thought,” She stated, her voice as calculated as her words. “He is sick with heartache over his friend and I am caring for him. Be gone, Pierre, it will do no one any good having you here.”

“Hélène, I-“

“I said _go_!” She snapped. “I have plenty to do and I do not need to worry about you and your guilt. Go now, I am sure they are serving drinks at the club by now. You are more welcomed there.”

Hélène closed the door and she waited, watching as Pierre sighed, and he paced, and he finally took his leave. She waited, clutching the repaired bow to her chest like a security blanket, until he walked far into the distance and she could see him anymore, and then she ran.

She took the stairs three at a time and cared little if she slipped, and she did not stop until she was at the door to Anatole’s bedroom. She felt a dread, and an ill-feeling sinking in a gut at every horrid thought that passed her mind, and then pushed the door open.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was initially supposed to be longer but I am staring down the barrel of a week of absolute hell and did not think I will have the time to write much so I wanted to just post something this week. Anyways, this was where Helene was when Dolokhov could not find her.


	18. Chapter 18

It was the smell that flooded her first, overwhelming her senses with something sickly, thick, and acidic, and…wrong. It overpowered the cold metallic smell of winter on her boots and her own sour dread, it sat heavy on her tongue and coated the back of her throat in a way almost choking, she ignored it.

She gripped the violin bow to her chest as she took stock of the dark room with critical eyes, of the curtains pulled together like Anatole hated so no afternoon light warmed the floors, of the table untouched and the meals still under their covers. She took stock of Dolokhov’s absence and she looked for blood, for bone and tissue, and death, and she found none.

She just barely made out the form in the bed, the moonlight sliver of pale flesh against quilts of navy and maroon. She just barely managed to keep the relief from crawling from her throat in childish sobs, just barely.

She expected the worst, this was not that.

Hélène stepped hesitantly into the room, feeling a childlike fear creep into her consciousness as the darkness encompassed her and she drown in all the ways that the dark and the quiet were so unlike her brother.

Anatole had been a winter child – boyish, and odd, and so full of light and movement and love for as long as she could remember him. The darkness had never touched his winter-sun soul, had never been a part of him even when childish wants gave way to spoiled tantrums and fat rolling tears.

She missed the boy, she missed her childhood friend, her naïve brother, and the charming prince he grew into. Her heart ached at the realization that she no longer expected to see him, to see the carefree smile, to hear tales of the most beautiful girls and the way his heart filled with such sweet emotion, to be embraced and kissed, and loved when she walked into this room.

She expected blood and anger, she did not find it. She expected death of this stranger that was now her brother, she saw only the pathetic shiver of the bedded figure. She expected so much terrible things, “Anatole, mon Coeur.”

She was Hélène, fearless of the nightmare monsters in childhood closets, fearless of their father’s wrath, and the mean words said by traveling princes. She was Hélène, fierce and protective, and Anatole could fear nothing while she held his hand.

She was Hélène and he _was_ Anatole, and everything was to be okay when they were together, everything was to be lovely, and safe, and no one would ever need to feel the blue of sadness, but… but the doctor had been _here_ and promises vowed in adolescent games meant very little in harsher realities.

Anatole had not greeted her.

She swallowed a wail, a cry, and adjusted her grip on the bow as she took another step into the room. She was Hélène and he would always be her Anatole, no matter how he changed. There were no barriers between them.

She breathed out and then took a shaky breath within her, she calmed her nerves and felt the bullish Kuragin stubbornness build within her. She felt its steeliness overwhelm all her fear and the akin feeling of regret. She let it crush every doubt, every worry, and she vowed to her god and to his that she would not allow barriers to be built between them without a bloody fight.

She vowed, and she stepped, and confidence echoed with her heels in the silence and deathly stillness. Anatole shifted in the bed, a whistled mewling sound escaped through his lips but he said nothing as she marched across the wooden floorboards. She was too set in her determination to hear the dreaded way his breath hitched and the following whimper was lost to the screech of curtains being thrown open.

Hélène basked in the orange light and she smiled a smirk so mischievous and natural as she turned on her heels, her dress swishing with life and purpose, “We have pitied ourselves long enough, dear brother, it is time to live and love. Now, tell me what it is that I must do to fix all of your problems.”

Anatole did not acknowledge her presence or her words, though she knew that he was awake. He was slumped against silk pillows, face half pressed into their fluff and a hand laying over his closed eyes. His breathing was audible and labored, but breathing.

She took comfort in the whistled breath, “Anatole, mon beau, I have spoken to you. I demand to be listened to.”

His breath shuttered but no answer poured from his lips, not even a nonsensical one. She frowned, “I demand to be spoke to like the two adults that we are. These games were not funny even as children.”

He flinched at her tone and said nothing in return.

Stubbornness, she thought, his willpower had never been stronger than hers.

“I am your equal, brother, you confidant and despite your anger, I still hold a piece of your heart, as you do mine,” She said, taking up position on the corner of the bed as she had many times while he wasted in his unconsciousness. She frowned at his shivering shoulders and the dampness of the thin sheet wrapped around him. “You live in my house and I wish you not elsewhere, but I do wish to be respected. You must tell me why you brought the doctor, you must – Anatole, are you listening?

His breathing was shallower, like that of a panic attack but too exhausted for the flair of it, and his hands curled away from his closed eyes to press over his ears, a whine pulling pathetically from his lips.

She frowned and pressed her knuckles to his forehead the way their father always did. She decided that yes, he was a little warm but, “You have always been prone to running a little hot, brother, it is no reason to call for a doctor.”

Anatole flinched from her rough handling but embraced the cool comfort of her touch, mumbling something with little syllables and no words as tears slipped from beneath his eyelids, “Your words, Anatole, please tell me what it is that wrong?”

He mumbled with a thick tongue and she didn't understand any of it. Her frown grew harder, more pronounced, and a feeling of helpless loss flooded her. She felt as if she’d missed something, “Anatole, why was a doctor sent?”

She grew frustrated in the way panic and unanswered questions forced her. She gritted her teeth at her brother’s inability to just _speak_ , to make the effort to be understood as she noticed he did with Dolokhov. It was cruel, it made her angry.

Her hand slipped from his forehead to his shoulder and she shook him roughly, “Anatole, we are done with these stupid games. Your health is my concern so open your eyes and your mind, and _speak_ to me.”

“I understand your anger and that you feel that it is I that you must direct it to,” She told him, shaking him more. “I understand that you wish to make me feel terrible for my concern and my love for you but if you wish to be tenacious in your anger than find other means and tell me why it was that Dr. Kutnetsov visited.”

He gasped something raspy and pained, and cried out in strangled wailing, and it _scared_ her. Hélène drew her hand back in surprise as Anatole gripped at his head and his hair, and cried more openly than she had ever seen.

Hélène felt all her confidence plummet into her stomach because Anatole’s face was painted with pain, and nausea, and she did not know what she did to cause it, “My god, Anatole, what – Anatole, no, hush. Anatole, _stop_!”

Her words fell on no ears and shattered to floor as she took the hands clawing at his ears, and his face, and tangling tightly in blond hair as tears wetted his cheeks. She took his hands in he own and she held them gently and close, and she did not give in to his fight or his pull, “Anatole, hush, Anatole-“

Hélène blinked hard and pressed her lips into a narrow line and she told him in a firm low voice, “I won’t allow you to hurt yourself.”

She repeated the words as he sobbed, as he pulled, as she remembered the times when nervous quirks and oddities were thought to be _cute_ and _childish_ and how they turned destructive too fast. She remembered the ticks and the manifestation of anxiety that their mother had cooed at and encouraged, and the way Anatole would scratch at his flesh until it broke and bled, the way he’d tug on his hair until it pulled from his scalp. She remembered being horrified by it and not understanding.

She remembered her father hard role in breaking the habits, remembered bruised knuckles from ruler thwacks, and all the ways it had felt cruel. And she felt…she felt scared to see the habits returning, “Anatole, please, speak to me, I am worried.”

“Anatole, please, tell me what is wrong.”

“Anatole, please, it will be okay just _talk_.”

“Anatole, please.”

His movements grew weak too quickly, grew slow and sloppy, and limp, and he lost his fight. He could pull his wrist from her hands regardless of his fingernails digging into her skin. He gave up his fight and allowed her to win, to pull him close and encircle him in comforting arms.

He did not melt into her arms so much as he broke and shattered, and cried.

Anatole cried ugly sobbed weeping, as if even the act of wailing was too exhausting. He gave up struggling and allowed her to guide his head to wet the side of her neck with a gentle hand on his neck. She shushed him, “No need to be upset, there is no need to cry. I am not angry, Anatole.”

She petted his hair and told him gently, “I forgive you for your behavior, I forgive everything. We must move passed our disagreements.”

“We can eat, Anatole, and – and we can be merry, you are-“ His hands were shaking as they curled into fists around the fabric of her dress. His shoulders heaved sobs and she squeezed him to her but he cried even more. She did not believe the calmness in her own voice, “Hush, brother.”

He pushed against her suddenly with strength, and she struggled to keep him close. To let go was to lose and she could not allow it. He sobbed louder, helpless and broken words that meant nothing fell from his lips, and she felt her own pinpricked tears, “Let us put this behind us, brother. Love me once one, Anatole, please, I – I’m sor-“

“What are you doing?”

Dolokhov’s voice broke through the struggle and Anatole’s eyes snapped open before slamming shut with pained gasp. Hélène shushed him, ran her hands over his shoulders and down his shaking back, and glared hard at Dolokhov, “What happened?”

Dolokhov hissed a low threatening tone through his teeth and shot her a hard and annoyed look of destructive fire but said nothing of use. Hélène felt taken back but she did not show it as she narrowed her own eyes. She insisted, “Dolokhov, tell me what is wrong?”

“Hélène,” He said in a soft quiet voice that juxtaposed his war-hardened face and the harshness in every silent step into the room. He gave her a look that foretold something but her nerves were wired and her focus too narrow to be able to decipher it as he closed the curtains once more.

The only light seeping into the room was from the open door. Hélène felt as if she was reading the wrong script as she took the concern in Dolokhov’s eyes but she pushed it aside and she demanded answered, “The doctor was here, I demand to know the reason. Tell me, now!”

“Quiet!” He snapped and then cursed under his breath as Anatole flinched violently, a whine tore beneath his muffled sobs and struggled for hands for the briefest second. Dolokhov’s voice was nearly nonexistent as he apologized to Anatole for his tone.

Hélène sent him an almost desperate look as understanding started to draw on her, she noticed the bin that Dolokhov had carried under his arm, put a name to vile acidic smell of the room. She whispered, “He is ill?”

Dolokhov nodded, mouthing the words ‘ _head pain_ ’ and _‘where were you?’_ and a part of Hélène knew deep in her crumbling heart why he was asking. Anatole asked for her and she was not here, _again_.

“Anatole, I did not know,” Hélène said softly, rubbing at his shoulders. He did not shield away from the touch but it did not relax him either. He did not offer her a word or sight of his blue eyes. “I did not know.”

“I was on the grounds,” She explained in soft frantic words. “They are large, as you know, I did not – I came as soon as I knew that something was wrong. I – I should have been here, I should have been with you.”

“Hélène,” Dolokhov’s voice was nothing and Anatole did not flinch to it. She felt a jealousy in her for the man that knew her brother so much better than she did. “Allow him sleep, he is ailing. Let us discuss in the hallway.”

She sighed, closing her eyes and pressed a kiss lightly to the top of Anatole’s head. She took in the rose scent of his shampoo and perfume and the smell of citrus fruit, the smell so distinctly Anatole. She was soft and gentle as she guided him into the sheets and watched as he curled around himself.

He looked pain, her heart shattered.

“I can make it better, dear brother, you know that I can,” She reached for his hand and careful extracted it from its clenched fist. She pulled the bow from where she forgotten she dropped it, and she pressed it into his palm, curling his fingers around it. “I had it fixed, brother, nothing is broken any longer.”

Anatole did not react in any way that she found pleasing, dropping the bow on the mattress with little care and pressed his hands into his eyes as he sat up in the bed. He listed almost too far over and flinched when Dolokhov’s hand stopped his descent and pushed his back into the pillows.

Hélène’s brows pulled together, “Don’t – Anatole, don’t you like it?”

“Hélène,” Dolokhov’s voice was firm and low, and he gestured with a tilt of his head to the hallway.

She did not want to go, she wouldn’t when Anatole was in such pain and she opened her mouth to say so but Dolokhov’s gaze was shifted from her to her brother with a concern that matched her own. She sighed.

 She fussed with the blankets and pulled them over his lap and tucking them around him. She told him, “Brother, I am not leaving you but I-“

“No,” He slurred, his movements were languished and sloppy but he managed to find a part of her to hold on to. His hand wrapping around her arm weakly but it felt as if it was steel. “H’rt, dn’go.”

“I can make it all better, brother, I promise,” She told him, pleading unbelievable and impossible promises as she pried his hand from her arm. “Dolokhov must explain to me what is wrong. I will not be gone for long, I promise.”

Promises meant little, she realized with sinking dread but she forced one foot in front of her other as she walked into the hallway. Dolokhov followed not long after, finding her in a sharp pace, “What is the meaning of all of this, Dolokhov, how could you not-“

“I could not find you,” He stated calmly, anticipating her questions. “I did not know – he is in pain, it is evident, and he was sick multiple times in your absence. I chose to be safe rather than sorry, it was not my intention to worry you.”

“Well, you did,” She stated plainly and then sighed, she closed her eyes and forced herself to remember better days to come, to calm her beating heart. “You were not wrong in your actions, I just – why is he in so much pain? He was getting better, yes?”

“The doctor explained to me migraines from the head injury,” He explained. “There is not much that can be done but to make him comfortable. I was given the directions to a concoction that will help with pain, it is being made now.”

She nodded but from the frown lining her face, it was evident that she was not happy with the solution, “Is there nothing more that can be done?”

“Maybe try not to yell when you’re in the same room as him,” Dolokhov offered and she glared. He held his hands up, a half-amused tired smile wormed onto his bearded fact. “It is mere suggestion, Countess, but it appears effective. Anatole is suffering from sensitivity to sound and light, as far as I can tell. He has complained of blankets being too heavy in more lucid moments.”

“It is as if he has regressed to his first days waking,” Dolokhov told her softly. “His words are slurred and his actions impaired, the pain is taking his energy from him. Do not expect a lot.”

“I promised to help him.”

“You should not have promised what you cannot fulfil, Countess,” He stated but sighed, “I suppose just staying with him would suffice, he wants you there.”

“There must be more that I can do than that.”

Dolokhov shrugged, “You can check with the cooks, I gave them the directions not too long ago but it should not take long to make.”

She nodded, “Then I shall do that. I will not be long, tell my brother that.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is slow and I don't entirely like it but it was getting really long. School is still awful so updates will likely continue to be slow.


	19. Chapter 19

Hélène did not go to the kitchen.

She walked down silent halls with silent footfall and she did not look behind her. She walked down unforgiving wooden stairs still sticky beneath her winter boots from dried uncleaned vodka, and she did not turn around. She stood in the front hall, willed her feet to move but felt only the heavy weight of the world crushing down upon her shoulders.

She felt the cracks in her armor, in her mask, in the control she thought that she held so tightly to her chest, and she did not know how to mend it. She did not know how to fix her brother.

She did not know what it was that possessed her, that ran over all reason in her mind and her heart, but she did not go to the kitchen, did not take a simple step in its direction. She did not gather her fur coat lying over the stair’s banister, did not grab her fur-lined gloves, nor earmuffs. She left no letter, no message.

She did not go to the kitchen, she walked out the door.

She did not turn around, did not look back.

She felt not the sharpness of winter cold seep into her bones nor the creeping dull warmth of the setting sun. She felt nothing but the icy dread building jagged crystal castles in her stomach, felt tears freeze to the corners of her eyes, and an all-encompassing obsession claw at her mind, and her heart, and her every desire until all she felt was the sticky warmth of blood’s phantom touch.

She wiped her numb hands upon her dress before shaking the horrible memories of the way blood congealed and pulled at the skin as it dried, shook herself of all the terrible thoughts of Anatole’s broken head, and the doctor’s words, and all the hope that she felt die within her.

She wished to speak with the doctor, she _needed_ to speak with the doctor.

She did not slow in her fast steps until she saw Kuznetsov’s furred coat in the distance, closing the gap between the Bezukhov manor and his own. She slowed only once she recognized the tall and stout figure beside him in his walk, feeling the cold curl into her veins for the first time. She gritted her teeth, she did not care, “Doc – Doctor! Dr. Kuzukhov!”

“My goodness, girl, you must be freezing!” He remarked in a horrified voice as she stumbled in the snow in her approach. He embraced her to steady her and rubbed his furred gloved up and down her arms to produce a kind of heated friction. She felt nothing but the sick sense of dread, “I – I wish to speak with you, Doctor?”

“A letter would not do?” He asked incredulous. “The matter is urgent enough that you could not grab a coat? My god, you will freeze through.”

“Hélène-“

“I am not here for you, Pierre,” She snapped viciously even as she accepted the fur coat that he shed and wrapped around her shoulders. “I do not wish to speak with you. It is of – it is important, Doctor.”

“Countess, has something occurred since my absence?”

“I…” She paused, her mouth feeling the kind of numb that came with Russian winters, her words felt sloppy and unrehearsed. She realized suddenly the way she must appear, crazed and indecent, and an overwhelming sense filled her. She felt as if she could cry, “Alone, Doctor, if we could.”

She did not give him the time to respond, did not give him anything except a strong pull on his arm until he took the steps to distance them from Pierre. She rounded on him, “Did you tell him?”

“I have gave no information of confidentiality, Count-“

“Did you tell him of my brother?” She hissed lowly. “He mustn’t know of Anatole’s condition, of – of _anything_ regarding him. Did you breathe his name?”

“No, I-“

“Do not lie to me,” She snapped. “You were deep in conversation and Pierre is an old friend, what was it then that you were discussing?”

“We were discussing you, if you must know, Countess.”

“What?” She asked but dismissed her own question. “Why would – it doesn’t matter. You cannot speak of Anatole to Pierre, I have paid you enough to warrant the secrecy.”

“I gave you my word, Countess.”

“I wish to speak of Anatole now,” She told him. “Do you have a moment?”

“It is freezing.”

“Then a moment is all it will take. What is wrong with him?”

“He is experiencing what appears to be a migraine,” The doctor said in a clinical tone. “I explained this to Mr. Dolokhov, it is likely a result of his head injury.”

“He is in unbelievable pain,” She stated. “I wish for you to make it go away.”

“I am a physician, not a magician, Hélène, I cannot prove a cure for the incurable,” He told her. “I have provided the instructions for something to lessen his pain but no more can be done, it will pass.”

“When?”

“It could be hours, it could be days. There is no way of knowing, Countess.”

She groaned annoyed and put her hands on her hips, “It has to be today, we are – we are having a dinner, it is his favorite and-“

“See through your hysterics, Countess, I cannot-“

“I am not hysterical,” She stated, scoffing. “I am wealthy, I can pay whatever it is-“

“I have told you, it must pass on its own. There is nothing I can do.”

She rolled her eyes and looked away, feeling very cold and overwhelmed. She sighed and asked, “What of me were you discussing?”

“I-“

“He is my husband, whatever you were comfortable saying in front of him than you can say in front of me.”

“He is concerned,” The doctor stated, not seeing the value in fighting her reasoning. “About your well-being. You, uh – Pierre does not think that you are taking the death of your brother well which is, uh, confusing, all things considered.”

“It is not that confusing,” She stated coldly. “Pierre thinks him to be dead because I told him that he was, it is not your place to correct him.”

“I-“

“My well-being is sound, there is nothing that must be discussed.”

“Of course, Countess, it is not as if you ran out in fridge temperatures in nothing but a simple dress,” He said plainly and she narrowed her eyes. “I can see the cause of his concern, you look exhausted. I am sure this experience has been taxing on you.”

Hélène did not bother to hide the shiver than ran through her as the winter winds picked up and wrapped herself in Pierre’s big fur coat around her shoulders. She simply dismissed him, “I shall not keep you any longer, Doctor, thank you.”

“Countess, I understand Pierre’s worry. I, myself, have concern-“

“That is enough,” She stated. “It is all misplaced and unnecessary, continue home to your wife and your children. I do not wish to keep you any longer.”

He bowed his head, knowing Hélène nearly as long as he had known Pierre and knowing just how strong the stubborn streak within Kuragins were. It was not worth the fight so he conceded, “Do find warmth soon, Countess, I do not wish to have to treat frostbite.”

“I will do,” She smiled and he left, exchanging words with Pierre before leaving the two of them. Hélène unwrapped the fur and threw it at him, “You are an idiot.”

“Because I am concerned for you?”

“I stated not even an hour ago that your concern is unwarranted,” She snapped. “Unwanted, and undesired, and it is selfish. You only want to relieve your own guilt.”

“I am concerned that you are not grieving,” He stated calmly and she hated him for it. He tossed his coat back to her and she let it fall into the snow between them, crossing her cold arms in defiance. “I have lost both my parents and many of my brothers, you do not grieve in any way that I have seen. It is denial, Hélène, and it can be dangerous.”

“This is – you are so stupid,” She accused. “I am not – this is not grieving. I have no reason to be, he is – he’s _gone_. I cannot change that, though I may wish to. You are an idiot, Pierre, a simple idiot.”

“You rush out in the cold-“

“For answers,” She snapped, gathering his coat once more from the snow and throwing it at him with force. “I simply wanted clarification about Anat-“

“Dolokhov, you mean?”

She gritted her teeth, “Yes, of course, that is what I meant.”

“Hélène,” He said softly, shaking the snow from his coat before closing the distance between them. She said nothing as he wrapped the fur around her shoulders. “You are cleverer than anybody I know, you must see what this looks like. You see why I am concerned, yes?”

“It’s misplaced.”

“Have you grieved, at all?” He sighed and she wanted to hit him, her hands curling to fist. “This isn’t healthy, keeping it all inside of you.”

“Because you would know health, eh?” She snarked. “All you do is drown yourself in drink, lock yourself in that damn study of yours and forget the world. That is healthy, yes?”

“Do you look for him in rooms?”

“What?”

“My father’s death was foretold long before he passed, I thought that I was prepared for it,” He stated. “At gatherings, people would ask of his condition and offer support, and smiles, and I did not think that I needed such because I was prepared. It was inevitable but when it happened, I felt a loss that never truly went away.”

“Even after the funeral, I would walk into his study or his room, and I would expect to see him there,” He continued. “I would think of topics I wished to discuss and realize that I could not go to him. I would attend dinners and events and turn to speak with him and he was not there. Those moments were worse than his death, worse than the funeral.”

“I have experienced death before, my mother-“

“You were never close to your mother,” He stated. “You were close to Anatole, he was your brother.”

An awful thought occurred to her, a vicious and selfish denial that ran too thin, how easy all of this would be if Anatole had died. How easy everything would be on her heart, and her soul, and her anger if Anatole was just a ghost that she expected to see in a room instead of the stranger he’d become.

Dolokhov was right, Dolokhov was _wrong_.

She did not wish her brother dead. She couldn’t and wouldn’t wish for such a thing and she thanked her god and the next that he still lived and breathed but she – it would have been _easy_. Anatole would not be in the pain that he was in and it would hurt less for her, she would be able to scratch and hit and cry to Moscow, to Petersburg of the horrible thing Pierre had done.

She could escape her boring husband if Anatole had died that night.

She could be free of the – the burden Anatole had become.

She was grateful that he was there, grateful for the moments when it felt as if they were both whole again. She was grateful that the worst of Anatole’s condition was her own selfish feelings of loss, but he _was_ lost. The Anatole that she loved, that she grew to adulthood with was gone and in his place, was a stranger with his face.

“I want my brother back.”

“Hélène-“

“You – you could have sent him away, he would have gone but you – you broke him instead. You _stole_ him from me and left me with – with a stranger!”

“Hélène-“

She hit him, swung wide and hard with a closed fist like the stable boys had taught her, and she missed. Pierre, too used to this for either of them to feel very comfortable with it, sighed and caught her hand when she came back with a slap.

She spat, “This marriage is a hell my father never imagined for me.”

“I offered you divorce.”

She pulled her arm away, “No.”

“Then allow me to care about you, _wife_.”

“ _No._ ”

“It does not have to be returned.”

“It won’t be,” She snapped. “How do you not understand, you idiot. You do not get to mend my heart when you were the one to shatter it. You _ruined_ him, you ruined the only perfection there was in my life. You – I will not get my brother back so what is your _point?_ ”

“There is nothing that you can help, nothing you can fix, Pierre, so stop trying,” She told him and sucked in a shaky breath, “I – I need to go home. Dinner is awaiting.”

“Hélène-“

“I need to go home now,” She stated, it was more to herself than to him. How had she left when the dinner was nearly done, when Anatole was ailing? “I need to return, there are better days, Pierre, today is one of them. I won’t accept any less.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anatole is to return in the next chapter! 
> 
> Believe it or not (and you probably shouldn't) we are approaching the end of this fic though there will likely be another, at a minimum, another five or six chapters.


	20. Chapter 20

Hélène ducked.

“Are you-“ She cut herself off with a hiss that sizzled into nothing at its ends and a stern look to the occupants in the room and then to the bow that nearly took off her head. She swore that Anatole’s saving grace was his luck because if the bow had snapped again then she did not think she’d be able to contain her anger, “You are such a _brat_.”

Her words drown unheard in the cacophony of falling noises and her presence in the doorway went unnoticed and unacknowledged. She frowned.

She had expected discontent, expected disappointment and an uneven stare of disenchantment as she continued to prove that she did not have all the answers, that she was not as clever or smart as Anatole always believed her to be. She had expected harsh words and harsher reprimand for her prolonged absence and she had come armed with reason and explanation. She swallowed them as the noise swallowed her, they meant nothing.

She narrowed her eyes at the mess and the men before they went wide. She felt as if she was intruded on something…intimate, private. “Oh.”

Dolokhov had abandoned his chair and the coarse fabric of his heavy uniform jacket in her absence, stripped to his trousers and a thin undershirt with his back to her and his knees pressed into the mattress. Anatole’s back was pressed to his chest and Dolokhov curled over him, rocking almost gently.

She could see the sweat gathered and dampening the back of Dolokhov’s shirt despite the chill in the air. She could see his mussed hair and the way his muscles shifted beneath clinging fabric.

She could not see his face buried in Anatole’s neck but she could hear the muttered rumble of his low deep voice mixed like melodies in the whimpers of her brother.

She thought to whistle, thought to call attention to her presence, thought to leave them before things became more intimate than cuddling, and then she thought better of it. She shifted the tray she held to one arm and leaned against the doorframe.

Anatole has spoken in lengths about Dolokhov over the years, first as acquaintances then friends, then the occasional lover. Whispered to her in the night like the whispers of young girls with secret first crushes, gushing like a child so carefree and in love, and he didn’t even realize it.

She had watched him pace and wave his hands in fascinating exaggeration, unable to comprehend the complexities of stoic assassins and the restrictions of society’s standards. She watched him grow frustrated at distances between them, watched him lust after a man he’d never truly have. She watched him fall in love, different from the little princesses and pretty girls, and find kinship in a man most avoided.

She had listened and wondered what it was that her brother found so enchanting about an assassin that had turned cruel intentions onto him more than once, that spoke to him like a child and called him rude names. Dolokhov was pretty – a handsome man and well respected – but even that eventually wore thin, but it hadn’t. She never quite knew why.

Anatole coveted a certain quality of control – he’d cared little of the war and its unpredictability, did not find bother in it but he longed for, _obsessed_ for control of his life. He wished to not be under their father’s thumb or any other’s, wished to live free of the demands of society on a young prince. He obsessed over control and its possession and yes, he surrendered it so easily. She supposed that was the appeal, then.

His little princesses and naïve countesses that he courted and bedded were cute, and pretty, and enrapturing but they were all too young and new, and his body was less innocent than his heart. Anatole, to a degree, liked being out of his depth, thrived on his anxieties and the rush of recklessness, and she supposed there was no greater absence of control than giving yourself away to the assassin that killed the Shah’s brother.

Dolokhov’s hypnotic calm broke into a hiss and then cracked into vulgar curses that nearly brought a blush to her own face as the back of Anatole’s head collided hard with his chin. His brother was shoved away from him in frustration, hard enough to nearly displace him from the bed.

“You son of a-“

Anatole’s movements were clumsily and his eyes closed as he curled in on himself and swiped blindly at any hand that came towards him. Hélène frowned at the rough display and Anatole’s whined mumbling.

A pillow bounced off Dolokhov’s head and Anatole swayed slightly as he pulled into a seated position at the headboard. He opened his mouth to speak but closed it with a hard swallow. He looked ill.

Dolokhov’s fight left him and Hélène realized that intimacy was not the goal here, it was restraint. She watched Dolokhov pick up a ceramic cup from the overcrowded bedside table and held it out to Anatole. He cleared his throat.

Anatole grabbed for the cup and Dolokhov pulled it back, “ _No_.”

She watched as something she could not decipher played out over their faces and Anatole threw another pillow at Dolokhov’s head, it was swiped from the air and tossed back with force. His voice was calm if calm was held together with fraying ropes, “I will not hand you another thing.”

“I-“ Anatole breathed out shakily through his nose and pressed the heel of his hand into his seeing eye. “’s mine. Ev’r-thing mine.”

“No.”

Anatole swallowed hard and his face grew red with frustration, offering no warning when he launched himself at Dolokhov with closed fist and clumsy movement. Dolokhov swore, grabbed Anatole by the arm so he did not tumble from the bed and twisted the limb away from him in a move too violent for Hélène’s liking.

Anatole cried out in pain or frustration, it did not matter, when his arm was wrenched behind his back and he was pressed face down into the mattress. Dolokhov’s curse was lost in Hélène’s own exclamation, “Unhand my brother, Fedya!”

Dolokhov still for a quiet moment between heavy breaths but Anatole didn’t, catching him in the gut with his foot. He scrambled away before Dolokhov could get his bearings, cradling his arm to his chest.

Hélène watched Anatole’s measured breathes and the queasiness that passed over his face as she avoided meeting the renounced fire in Dolokhov’s glared daggers. She waited and finally Dolokhov broke the silence, asking in a voice cold and annoyed, “Where have you been?”

“Perhaps I was out,” She stated, repeating his words from that very morning. “Perhaps, Fedya, I was feeding the horses.”

“Perhaps you were,” He replied in the same winter cold tone. “It matters little to me where you were because you were _not_ retrieving what _you_ said you were get from the kitchen, for _your_ brother who is in a great deal of pain.”

She set her teeth to an edge and her smile sharpened to a razor. She had prepared for this but it did not stop the stab to her heart and her pride, “And how much pain is he in after you beat him?”

“I was not – I wasn’t beating him.”

“I had to speak with the doctor for I had questions of my own,” She stated, addressing her brother who had not looked to her once. “I was not gone long, I will simply retrieve the drink now.”

“There is no need, I got it myself.”

Hélène had yet to meet Dolokhov’s eyes, not for any fear but simply because she did not care for the calloused look she knew to be there. She watched her brother instead, watched the effort in his shoulders as he pushed himself out of his slump and the shake of his trembling hands as he reached for the blue ceramic mug in Dolokhov’s hand. With great care and surprising speed, he snatched the cup from its grip.

Whatever it was that had transpired and for whatever reason, it had torn most of the sheeting from the bed, thrown half the pillows to the floor, and had left both her brother and Dolokhov in ridiculous dishevelment. She finally met Dolokhov’s blazing eyes and raised an unimpressed eyebrow to them as he realized he lost the possession of the mug, “Honestly, Fedya, all of this over a cup?”

Dolokhov’s eyes widened and then narrow but before he could edge in even a word, the cup shattered violently against the floor with the effort in which Anatole threw it. He flinched at the sound he made and Dolokhov sighed, “It is _water_ , you fool, there wasn’t medicine in it.”

All of Hélène’s amusement died on her lips as she caught sight of red, deep red running in dried rivers down Anatole’s white linen tunic and in splotches on his neck, and her breath shuttered in her chest. It felt as if the room had narrowed to a point and all that was, was red.

Her mind flickered back with vicious clarity to dark studies and broken skin, and blood, and the thick smell of copper and dust that clung to her like a haunting for days. She felt her breath clot and congeal in her throat and choke her with the taste of iron. She wiped her hands on her dress, “What – Anatole?”

She moved quickly, shoving the tray she was carrying hazardously and without care into Dolokhov’s arm, and was by Anatole’s side. She grabbed his jaw without thinking and pulled him towards her, feeling his pulse pound beneath her still-cold fingers.

It was not a sluggish pulse, it was cold skin and blood loss, it was not closed blue eyes with no promise of opening. He batted irritatingly at her hands with no effect as she tilted his head, searching for injuries and finding only red, “What is…”

She trailed off and her hands fell numbly to her side as her brother escaped her clutches to burrow beneath whatever sheets remained on the bed. She was pulled back to reality before it registered that Dolokhov was speaking to her, “What?”

“He would not drink the concoction,” He repeated, sitting the tray upon the table. “The ridiculous _fool_ in too much pain to even speak clearly, would not drink it because the taste is not favorable.”

“The cooks thought that he would enjoy it more if it tasted of cherries,” He added, Hélène noted the splashes of red on his jacket slung over his chair like drops of blood. “He didn’t.”

“Did he – “ She took a breath and calmed her composure. “Did he drink all of it?”

Dolokhov gestured to a dirty glass among the dishes and trays of uneaten food littering Anatole’s table, “I gave two options, to drink it or to drown in it. I did not allow him the second so he drank it.”

“And the-“

“It is the drink on his shirt, he will not allow me to help him change. He is too prideful, and _whiny_.”

Hélène fiddled with the fur of Pierre’s great coat still engulfing her in its pelts and she rolled her eyes, feeling ridiculous and foolish, and stupidly young for losing her head so easily, “Anatole is always whiny.”

“Yes, he is,” Dolokhov snorted, pulling the blanket off Anatole’s head with little care. It pulled a gasp from her brother and then groaned dissatisfaction when Dolokhov came closer. “Use your words, Kuragin, you _ass_. I have little patience for the rest of your antics.”

“He is irritated,” Hélène spoke, feeling something rise within her, a power and a purpose. It was familiar, indignant, and the warmth of an older sister with a troublesome brother, she had not felt such a feeling in so very long. “You cannot push him around like that. He is still in pain, it is evident and he feels ill, it will only make it worse if you act like a brute.”

“I have played the role of good friend, the caretaker, and he threw pillows at my head and broke dishes,” Dolokhov stated. Anatole pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes but offered no comment. “I am through being nice, it does not work. Fierce incentives have always worked.”

“Anatole,” She spoke softly, warmly, losing her glare to the assassin in favor of lighter eyes as she crouched down beside the bed. She rested her chin on the mattress and waited to be looked at.

When she wasn’t, she ran her fingers through his damp hair, “Brother, speak to me. How is your head?”

“Hurt.”

“Still?” She offered him a pout that he did not see and discretely attempted to fix his bandages. “You are not a child with a tantrum any longer, you mustn’t throw things when we are trying to help.”

“No more,” He snuffled and shoved her hand from his head, glaring at her. “ _No_ more.”

“We won’t make you drink anything else, I promise,” She smiled. “I am good for my promises, you know that.”

He narrowed his eyes and huffed, rolling to his other side and then settling back onto his back. He reached out with no aim and stated expectantly, “Blank-et.”

She sighed, looking to blankets and the glass on the floor before pulling the coat from her shoulders and draping it over him. It would be warmer than any blanket anyways, “Anatole, do not fight the drowsiness you are feeling, it is the medicine at work.”

“G’way.”

“Ana-“

“You leaf – lef _t_ ,” he said from under the coat. “You – you said you’d be back.”

She frowned, “I am back.”

He snorted and looked away, “’way, Hélène. Aban- a-band-don me again.”

Hélène told herself to hold her annoyance for another day, that Anatole was weak, and ill, and he was in enough pain to warrant his childish behavior, “Brother, I have no intention of _ever_ -“

“Pierre.”

“What?”

His words ran together in a rush and he took a deep breath before stating with urgency, “Coat, Pierre.”

“It is Pierre’s coat,” She nodded.

“Where is P-Pierre?” He asked, sitting up and listing over, the nausea drifting in and out of his features like a boat on water. “He can – he _will_ fix me. He can-“

“Pierre is not here.”

“But-“

“He has nothing to offer but his absence,” She stated, her voice dipping into an iciness she had not used with her brother in some time and he felt it, deflating all over again. “Anatole-“

 “No.”

“Anatole.”

“ _No_.” His voice broke into a crumble and he pressed his trembling hand to his mouth before pulling the coat over his head. His voice was nearly mechanical with effort to not be anything else, “Go away, Hélène.”

“Brother, please.”

“Wh-what did I do wr-wrong?” He asked and her hear ached. “Is – P-Pierre does not want to – to see me ‘cause I – I am br-broken.”

“You are not _broken_ ,” She snapped, a defensiveness that surprised even her. “You are Anatole, and you are perfect as you are.”

She pressed her lips together and sighed, Anatole did not believe her and in truth, she did not know if she believed herself. She walked to the table and took one the warm bowls from the tray before returning to Anatole’s side, “mon cher, brother.”

When she got no acknowledgment, she continued pulling the coat down from his head, “I had the cooks make your favorite meal. See, the day is already better.”

Anatole looked with dreaded disgust upon her and pushed away the bowl, “No.”

“We don’t need Pierre, Anatole, simply-“

“ _No.”_

He was more persistent but so was she. They both needed better days and she refused to have this one slip away anymore, shoving the bowl into his hands, “You were not raised to be so ungrateful, brother, the cooks made this for you so you are to-“

Anatole was better than he had appeared earlier that day, more alert and thus more difficult, and she was tired of it, “You are truly a _brat_. I have had your favorite meal prepared and-“

“Hélène, I don’t think-“

“I am not _done_ ,” She snapped, addressing Dolokhov and his rude interruption before turning back to her brother. “I am truly tired of this behavior, Pierre is not here and it is no fault of yours.” 

“ _Hélène_ -“

“No, Fedya,” She snapped, not looking to him. “Stop your pitying, Anatole. You have survived to live and love another day, that is all you have wanted and-“

Hélène gasped as the bowl was shoved back into her unexpecting hands, overturning with the force and fell into her lap. She jumped back and it scolded her through the fabric of her dress, “Anatole!”

Anatole struggled in the bed, managing to detangle himself from the coat and retched red drink over the side instead of on the sheets.

Dolokhov sighed, “He is nauseous, Hélène, he has been all day.”

“Thank you, Dolokhov the _genius,_ ” She replied sarcastically. “I did not know.”

He raised an unimpressed eyebrow at her, “You might have, if you were here.”

“Don’t you-“

Anatole whimpered and wiped at his eyes and his mouth with shaking hands but Dolokhov had no more sympathy for Kuragins today, “You could have had a drink of water had you not shattered the cups.”

Hélène sent him an irritated glare and then grabbed one of the old dishes upon the table, emptied its contents onto the floor and filled it with water before thrusting it into her brother’s hand. He dropped it without ever having a good grip on it to begin with, soaking his shirt and the blankets, and he cried out frustrated and fumbling with the glass.

Hélène did not sigh even as he hurled it at the floor, just barely keeping the anger from her voice, keeping the frustration and tears from her eyes, “ _Anatole!_ ”

“GO!” He protested in a cracking voice, his own frustration and tears overwhelming his eyes. He did not even care for the red or the water, pulling the coat over his crying head, “G’way, I – go!”

“Hélène.”

“What?” She snapped, turning to Dolokhov with a vicious look but his eyes said it all, _leave_.

“You should get cleaned up,” He spoke, the undercurrent loud and clear, and it hurt. _You are making things worse, leave_. “I will handle the glass.”

She did not know what to say so she said nothing, offered nothing, and left the room dejected and hurt.

 

Hélène did not look when a glass was sat in front of her.

Her hands clasped and her forehead rested against them, eyes closed and dressed as if she was mourning in deep black satin. She did not need to look up for she knew who it was and who it wasn’t, and it was not who she desperately wished for.

“Are you praying?”

“I do not believe that God has heard any of my words for a long time now,” She stated and then sighed. “It is a child’s prayer anyways, hoping for holy intervention.”

Dolokhov shifted and took the chair across from her, “I would tell you that he does not mean to hurt you.”

“But I would not believe you,” She said sadly, opening her eyes and folding her arms in front of her. “It is true, Anatole is not needlessly cruel but in my heart…it cannot take this any longer.”

“It is the migraine.”

“it is the head injury,” She stated. “It has changed him in ways I do not understand. He’d rather have Pierre, the brute, _the bore_ , than his sister. I do not understand.”

“He has high expectations, Hélène,” He replied with ease. “He always has, that is why no young girl or pretty princess will ever fulfill him. It is why he is difficult, why he expects more from you.”

“He wants Pierre,” She repeated. “Why doesn’t – he doesn’t know what happened and I cannot break that to him but I cannot allow Pierre to-“

“I will not try to change your mind, I know that I cannot. I know that Anatole loves you, will love you, and that he will see reason soon.”

“I wish I could believe you.”

Dolokhov shrugged and a smirk curled his lips, “Well, I am a genius.”

“It was said in jest.”

“I took it to heart.”

She rolled her eyes and then aske din a quiet voice, “Do you think I am going mad?”

“Hélène, I have no believe that there is a Kuragin out there that is not at least partly crazed.”

“But mad? Truly mad, Pierre thinks I am going mad.”

“Pierre is an idiot.”

She said up a little straighter and sighed, “Yes, he really is but is he a _right_ idiot. Anatole appears to trust his judgement.”

“Anatole is an idiot.”

She sighed and fixed her eyes on the ceiling instead of Dolokhov, “I dream so much more now. I dream of red, and blood, and wake with its taste in my mouth from biting my tongue. It is madness, isn’t it?’

“It’s trauma.”

She fixed him an awful look, “I am not traumatized, nothing has happened to me.”

“Yes, nothing has happened to _you_ ,” He replied, crossing his arms over his chest. “Nothing except that you watched a man that already frightened you before beat in your brother’s skull. I saw you the next morning, your eyes the same distant in which men speak of war and women of deranged husbands. I saw the blood, I’ve been in that study. It is drenched in it, it _is_ traumatic.”

“I am not a weak princess, don’t be ridiculous.”

“You are simply human,” He replied. “You are allowed your weaknesses, allowed to have feelings, Hélène. You’re allowed to be scared, and lost, and make mistakes. What you are not allowed-“

“You don’t get to tell me what I am _allowed_ to-“

“You are not _allowed_ to make these matters worse because you cannot see your way out of your own self-loathing,” He stated. “I love you, Kuragina, you are dear to me, as is your brother. I do not adore seeing you both so miserable.”

“How did you see yourself out of your self-loathing?” She asked. “I know you feel guilt, I know that you wish to protect him and feel as if you are failing. How did you see yourself out?”

“I didn’t,” He stated, leaning back. “I built a nest and I live in my self-loathing, I do not let it affect you and I do not show it to Anatole.”

She sighed and sunk into her chair, “Today was not a better day.”

Dolokhov snorted, “No, it wasn’t.”

“It was the _worst_.”

“The absolute worst.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Better days are to come in the next chapter.


	21. Chapter 21

Hélène did not say much.

It was the way of the Kuragins to say little, to listen with intent and clever faces as if there sparks and thoughts behind their eyes. It was an act and a deception with nods and hums of neither agreement nor discontent, and Dolokhov hated the ever so calculated tilt of the head.

She said little in the flickering flames of the fireplace. She hummed and spoke none as the shadows danced across her face in a way that was almost haunting.

She said nothing and Dolokhov, he spoke.

He filled the drunk air and the smoke-heated silence with inane chatter of no importance because he could not stand the silence, could not stand the heft of defeat that weighed heavy on Hélène’s shoulders. He could not stand _it_ , this dreadful and terrible _it_.

He longed for pasted days, for the simpler days in which Hélène was beautiful and illusive, and Anatole was a happy fool. He longed for the simplicity of war, of battle, of the return to a mother and a sister that knew little of how to handle the returning horrors of combat and the blood stained in his uniform but embraced him all the same.

He longed, mostly.

In his heart of hearts and his soul, and every atom possessed in his miserable being, he longed for the absence of the thoughts and feelings that overwhelmed his senses and his dreams with no words so encompassing to express them. No way to speak of what it was that he did not understand, only to drown in its mystery as Hélène drown herself in whiskey.

Today was no day for cups.

They drank from bottles not shares, and Hélène said nothing as they grew drunk and unhappy in the drawing room with the drying flame in the fireplace. He watched with no interest, slumped heavy in his chair, as she wavered in her stand and her drunken gait as she staggered around the room.

He thought to worried of her proximity to the fire and then he didn’t think of it at all.

He did not see where she pulled the letters from, only her brandishing them as if some prize, and he watched as the fire came to life once more with each letter dropped into it.

“Anatole’s letters,” She said without prompting. “Letters to _Pierre_ , you have written a lot of them. I recognize your handwriting.”

“It was asked of me.”

“Anatole’s handwriting is still dreadful,” She stated, holding up one before committing it to the fire. “That is a comfort.”

“He has not yet grown discouraged with the lack of response.”

“Anatole is persistent in all of his pursuits,” She hummed, adding yet another letter to the flame. Dolokhov felt a flicker like an extinguished candle in his heart, it tasted of regret and guilt as the paper curled and burnt in the heat. “He is an idealist, bless his fragile heart, that man will never come.”

“He could come if you-“

“Do not speak to me of that,” She snapped, throwing the rests of the letters half-hazarded into the flame. “I tell Anatole that I will deliver the letters and I don’t, the man will _never_ come.”

She paused. In her drunkenness, her mask slipped away and revealed too much. She looked as if she had been struck, slapped and shocked, and hurt, “I am an awful sister.”

“You are not awful,” He slurred tiredly, rubbing at his eye with his thumb. “You simply care in the wrong ways.”

“There was no compliment in those words.”

“There was not meant to be,” He stated. He was not sure if it was the liquor or the lack of sleep that was loosening his tongue in far too many ways. “You think you are right, that you are doing the right thing, and you are _trying_. I know that but you cannot see thought from reason and are as assured of yourself as a mad man is of his sanity. You cannot be convinced that you are wrong.”

“I am not wrong.”

“You _are_ ,” He insisted, drinking from his bottle. “Did you learn anything from speaking with the doctor, beyond what it was that I told you.”

She set her jaw into what was almost a pout if she was not too proud for it, crossing her arms, “No. I hardly see why that matters.”

“There was no reason to go and all the reason to stay,” He stated. “You will not admit it to me but do not delude yourself, you wished to see Bezukhov.”

“I do not-“

“You wish to set his soul on guilt’s razor edge and you pray that it cuts even deeper,” He snapped. “Your actions are not for justice, they are vindictive.”

“So, what if they are?” She asked defensively, throwing out her arms. “So, what? Am I not allowed to be a little vindictive, to exact a level of revenge. I have lost everything!”

“Anatole is upstairs.”

“It hardly matters,” She spat. “I am held neither in his heart or his arms any longer, he does not wish to have me. He has severed our bond, time and time again since waking. He does not wish to have me then I will stop reaching out, it is hopelessly pointless.”

He did not know if it was heat of frustration rolling in his stomach or Hélène’s icy cold dismissal, did not know if it was the bottle of finished whiskey or the second he opened, but Dolokhov spoke in revealing words. He opened his mouth and revealed the cards held closest to his chest, “I wish to take Anatole.”

She paused, “Come again?”

“I wish to take Anatole with me.”

“Take him where?”

“I have arrangements made for my mother and sister in the coming days to travel to Petersburg, it would be no hassle to accompany them and take him with me,” Dolokhov spoke in that way that soldiers relayed bad news. “She will not turn him away because of – of this. She has always enjoyed his-“

“ _Violin_ ,” Hélène stated coldly. “The one that he will not touch unless it is to smash it.”

“His company, Hélène, she finds him charming.”

“Anatole is charming,” She stated dismissively, wrapping her arms around herself. Something cracked in the air and Hélène laughed, devoid of humor and anything other than heartache, “It is not I that is mad, Fedya, it is you.”

“That so?”

“If you think that I will allow you to take my brother from me than you are truly mad.”

“Because you are doing him so well.”

“You are the one that allowed him to bruise his shins and damage his hands,” She snapped. “I have seen how you _care_ for him and you are cruel. You use rough hands and your intentions are violent.”

“And you have caused no harm?” He asked, standing from his chair so sudden that it skidded across the floor with a horrid screech. “It was my glass he cut his hands on but you were the reason for his panic, for his heartache and pain. You are the one that put forth the notion that he was no whole because he is different. I am cruel, yes, but you are bitch.”

Hélène gasped at the insult in offense and hurled her bottle at him, it bounced off his good shoulder ineffectively and clattered down to the table without breaking, “I will kill you.”

“I will kill you,” She repeated. “I will slaughter you in your _sleep_ if you even dream of taking him from me. He is my brother, my love, and I – I will kill you. I- I banish you from this house.”

“No,” He stated slowly, taking his seat once more and crossing his arms. “I care for him too, I care for him the same. If you wish to rid you of me than spill my blood, I will not fight you.”

“I have never been above striking a man when he is down.”

“I know,” Dolokhov replied easily. “I have seen your marriage.”

She gritted her teeth audibly and asked, “Take Pierre if you wish for company, Anatole is mine.”

“Might you ask him for his own opinion on the matter, he is grown and capable of logical thought.”

“Anatole has no say,” She snapped. “He lives in my house, he is my younger, and his injuries does not give him a voice in this discuss- no! This is not a discussion, it is over. My mind is made up and you are to leave.”

“I am going,” He stated, getting to his feet. “But only to ask Anatole of his thoughts.”

He did not even get to the door before Hélène had passed him. Dolokhov stopped, fell back against the arm the drawing rooms large couch and listened as her footfall trailed off into the distance and he laughed.

His laughter trialed off into nothing, wondering if he knew what he was getting into when he took the companionship of the blond idiot prince if he would have accepted. He sighed, he probably would have.

He noticed then, fluttered and flat to the floor, the folded paper and the scrawl of his own handwriting. It was a letter, to Pierre. 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My estimation that I'd need only five more chapters to wrap this up was a stretch, i think. I let these characters do whatever they want. 
> 
> Dolokhov is sassy in this chapter and I love it.


	22. Chapter 22

“You are ignoring me.”

“You are _not_ ignoring me, I know that,” Hélène muttered softly to herself, sitting at the end of the half-hazarded bed of mismatched blankets and sheets. She observed with drunk tired eyes the way pale skin looked otherworldly and translucent swimming in moonlight, and she felt overcome. “You are not ignoring me, you are asleep.”

A sadness seeped into her being and Anatole offered her not a word, even as she jabbed half-heartedly at his calf with pointed fingernails. He wouldn’t offer her anything, he couldn’t. He was asleep.

The physical word was something beyond his drug-addled consciousness and he would not be welcome back to it until the medicine ran its course, and that would not be until at least morning light. In the meantime, Anatole was owned to his dreams and Hélène, she spoke to deaf ears and empty walls.

She bared her heart to no one but she bared it all the same.

She knew that no matter her prodding, her words. She knew that no matter how many times she shook Anatole’s cold shoulder, he would not wake. She knew but it did not mean that she did not _want_ him to wake, “You won’t leave me, Anatole, I would not allow it.”

“You won’t, I have no need to worry.” She nudged at his feet with her elbow and when no response came forth, she covered them with fur and wool. “You don’t like when your feet are cold, I know that. Dolokhov doesn’t know that, he doesn’t know you as well as I do. No one does.”

“You are not to go with him, Anatole,” She commanded her sleeping audience, scolding him in the same way she has done since childhood. “It would break my heart into shattered pieces and I shall never recover of it, you-“

Hélène bit her lip, fiddling with the hem of her dress before standing from the bed. She gathered a discarded shirt from the floor and a forgotten pitcher of water from the crowded table. She did not speak again until she was wiping red from his flesh, “I know that you hate me, Anatole, but cruelness has never held place in your soul. Do not make room for it now, I beg of you. I cannot take that.”

“I am your sister,” She continued, her eyes fixated on the way youth overtook his face in his sleep and everything suddenly felt so much worse.

She pulled his arms from where they cradled close to his chest and maneuvered them into sleeves of a warmer sweater and she climbed into bed next to him. She leaned against the headboard and sunk below the sheets, and she wondered when thing got so _hard_.

There had been such an ease between them, in the days in which she was bigger than him, when her words meant little but meant everything. Where had it gone?

There had been an ease and a flow, and something very organic and natural, and childish, and wonderful in the days of their youth. In the days where all she had to protect him from were invisible monsters in grand closets and their mother’s harsh mood swings. There had been such an ease to _them_ and it was lost somewhere along the way, she did not think that she’d ever get it back, “Anatole…”

“Anatole, I have been by your side since before your feet walked with confidence,” She spoke, running her hands through his messy hair. “It will be me that remains by your side even if that confidence is lost forever. I will be by your side until the end of the known world, brother, and by it in the next.”

“It has been me, _always_ me, not – not Dolokhov,” She sniffled. “Not _Pierre_. Pierre is awful, Anatole. He is a monster and I hate him more than anything. I hate him so much. You are supposed to hate him, too.”

She sighed and scrubbed tiredly at her irritatingly dry eyes, feeling as if she was supposed to be crying but could not bring herself to tears, “I wish you would wake, I feel an anxiety in my chest when you sleep. I fear – I fear you won’t wake again and all will be lost.”

“I prayed – you do not know how much I prayed for your return to me,” She said with a sad laugh in her voice, feeling so ridiculous and simple for speaking to a man that could not hear her and would not care for her words anyways. “I prayed to God every single day since – since you were hurt, I begged him and to all those in Heaven that they could not keep you, that I – I need you-“

She shook her head and rolled her eyes, “God is mysterious, yes? You have been returned to me and I am grateful but you are not whole and I feel as if… you are fading from my touch.”

“I know that you hate me but I cannot lose you, Anatole, not again,” She whispered, pressing her lips to the sharp bone of his cheek. “I admit only because I know you hear none of this but I am at a loss of how to handle you. Your mind is a mystery to me as it has never been before but I have faith, faint that you will return to me in all your colors and affection.”

“You cannot go with Dolokhov,” She told him, taking his arms from the pillow crushed to his chest and wrapped them around her. She settled into his touch, into the familiarity of it, and she vowed in soft words, “I promise you, Anatole, I will make everything better when morning comes.”

 

“Honestly, what do you need all that rosemary for?”

Marya’s high brows pulled together from surprise to a flat annoyance and lips pulled down into a thinly-veiled grimace as pale winter morning sun overtook her porch and the woman in front of her. The fresh fall of frozen snow and engulfing natural of Hélène’s dark furs only worked to wash her face of all its color.

She looked nearly corpse-like, Marya frowned, “That is not a greeting of any kind.”

“I was not greeting you,” Hélène said as she stepped around Marya and escaped the cold into the front hall. “It is a genuine question, I am curious.”

“I have not permitted you entrance into my house.”

“Yes,” I suppose not,” Hélène mused as she shook the large snow-covered fur coat from her shoulders with little care of the mess it was making on the floor. “And yet, I am here.”

“Countess-“

“How is dear Natasha?”

Marya’s frown deepened into unforgiving lines and her eyes lit from within with scathing insult. Her voice remained measured, calm, the way mother’s spoke to unruly daughters, “You are like a pest.”

“I simply wish to borrow more, rosemary that is, if it is of no mind to you and then I’ll be out of your hair,” Hélène noted with a smirk along her lips. She spun around on her feet, taking in the front hall before brandish to Marya, “I have in exchange, brought a pie.”

“Did you make it?”

“With arsenic and poison, of course,” Hélène replied with a smile so innocent that it was anything but. She sat the covered pie onto a table and crossed her hands in front of her, almost polite,” That is your favorite, is it not?”

“I wish you to take it back with you.”

“That is rude.”

“May I inquire as to why you need so much rosemary?”

Hélène’s smile dropped, “No.”

“Then it appears I have none to spare,” Marya replied briskly, opening the door to the cold and the winter once more. “Now, I am asking you to-“

“Anatole likes – _liked_ Pelmeni,” She stated, it had always been best to float your lies on a sea of truth. “We always – it was made with an abundance of rosemary when my mother tended to the kitchen with the cooks, among other things. I wish to make it but… unforeseen incidents prevented me attending the meal that was prepared. I want the opportunity to try again.”

Marya did not say anything for passing moments and Hélène felt a discontent grow inside of her. It was a sinking feeling that all of this was for nothing when Marya noted with a false causality, “This is not your coat.”

“No, it isn’t,” Hélène replied coldly. “It belongs to Pierre, I wish to have returned to him but I cannot bear the sight of his oafish presence any longer. I… I have grown careless in my heartache and my anger, and I do not know how to encase it so I wish not to engage with the cause of it.”

“Pierre does not visit here any longer.”

“He will, he must,” She stated. “He has yet to speak with the young Bolkonsky, on the behalf of your darling Natasha. He will return to speak with you whatever the results.”

“He will write a letter.”

She sighed, “I suppose, he has always been a coward.”

Marya’s jaw creaked with a disagreement that morphed her face into something hard but Hélène continued with little care for it. She did _not_ want the coat, she would not keep it, “I know you still speak with him, that no monstrous cruelty displayed towards my family would matter to you. Will you return his coat for me or not? It is to lovely to throw in the trash.”

She said nothing, just observed with critical eyes before tilting her head ever so slightly. It was all the conformation Hélène needed before she dropped the offending item over the stair banister, “Good.”

“Marya made note, “You appear exhausted.”

“Life is exhausting,” She replied offhandedly. “There is a war going on.”

“And you have experienced a great loss.”

“As we all have, there is a _war_ happening,” She snapped defensively. “Take back the sadness in your eyes, Marya, and do not pretend you care for my brother or for me. I know that you don’t.”

“Call it curiosity.”

“I will call it gossip,” She stated.” Because that is what it is, what _you_ are. If you wish for great drama than go to the theatre.”

“It was simply an observation, no need for your defenses.”

“Perhaps your observations are better kept to yourself. Will you provide me the rosemary or am I wasting my time?”

“Perhaps that is also better kept to myself.”

Hélène’s jaw was a steel trap with an audible clench and she said with a hiss through her teeth, “Perhaps.”

“Very well,” Marya added.”

“I see not why-“ Hélène cut herself off with a hiss, her sneered face evening out into a blank mask as she brought a calmness as fleeting as letters in a fire to herself. “I do not see why you cannot give me a simple herb. I have given you my reasoning and I will pay, if that is what you wish.”

“It is not.”

“Then what, Marya, what is it that you want from me?” She asked. “Is it to see me weak and broken? Do you want to mother me to death as you try do to Pierre, to _Natasha_? I am neither your child nor your ward, I do not need your coddling and I will not give you the satisfaction of accepting it.”

“Hélène, I-“

“The sharpness of winter winds has kept even the drunks from the streets, from the bars, and troikas are scarce and yet, I traveled here,” She exclaimed. “Can you not see that it is of an incomprehensible value?”

“Yes, I see that plainly,” Marya replied and then gathered the coat from the banister. “Yes, I speak with Pierre regularly. Yes, I see him and he speaks of great worry for you, told me how just yesterday you ventured out into these sharp winds and frigid temperatures with only the clothes on your back. He thinks that grief has crazed you.”

“He is a fool.”

Marya raised her eyebrow at that and crossed her arms, Hélène gritted her teeth and snapped, “If you wish to criticize my life then the least you could offer is a stiff drink with your inane commentary, Marya.”

“You appear to have had plenty,” She stated. “You smell of a bar floor and your dress is wrinkled. Have you slept at all?”

“The rosemary,” She snapped defensively. “Marya, the _rosemary_. It is all I have come for.”

“I will give you rosemary.”

“Good.”

“You must attend church with me first,” She stated, eying her critically before shoving the coat into Hélène’s arms. “Wear this, your appearance is worse than that of the cheap whores.”

Hélène raised an eyebrow but said nothing as the coat was then taken from her and wrapped around her shoulders. Marya tsked, “To answer your question, Natasha is better but still very weak. She cannot make the short distance to the church and Sonya will not leave her side. You will accompany me today while I tend to my duties.”

“You volunteer at the church?”

“I do, three days a week,” She stated. “Put on that coat.”

“What is it that you expect me to do there?”

“Repent,” She stated flatly, it could almost be a joke. “Put that coat on, we are leaving now.”

“I am needed back at my own manor.”

“In due time,” Marya replied. “The church is not a far walk.”

“Why do I _need_ to go to church?” Hélène asked even as she slipped her arms into the large sleeves. “I have asked plenty of God in the pasted weeks and he has offered me only heartache and pain, I am not in his favor and I do not believe attending church will help that.”

“Not with that attitude, I should suspect not,” She replied in her brisk tone, gathering her own shawl and coat. “If you have any grievance, you should take it up with him.”

Hélène had always enjoyed the simplicity of churches.

She sat in the pews alone while Marya wandered off and she found herself struggling to maintain her false smiles, found herself lowering her eyes and clasping her hands in front of her. She found herself longing.

She longed for the churches of her childhood with their colored glass and echoing halls, longed for the old smell of must and cedar, and the way her father would hold her hand and she would hold Anatole’s. She longed for their mother’s soft prayers and Ippolit’s dull boredom, for their father’s veiled threats if Anatole did not stop kicking his feet. Better days, they used to be.

She longed for her better days.

Marya’s church was something small and intimate. Hélène knew faces but not names, and she felt painfully underwhelmed by the whole ordeal but she sat. She sat for promise of rosemary, for promise of better days. She read from the bible handed to her, and she listened, and she prayed.

Not of desires, not of wishes, she spoke in silent words and she said her thanks long-since delayed. She thanked God for what of her brother she had, for his stubbornness that frustrated her and his sweet sleeping face. She said her thanks for the strength and determination she held so close to her heart that she could fix the burnt bridges between them. She thanked him for Dolokhov and his selfless strength and his endless frustration that pulled her from her own self-pity.

And for the first time in many, many years, she thought of her mother with something other than stubborn loathing and harsh judgement. She thought of her as _someone_ other than the reason her shoulder grew damp with her brother’s tears. She thought not of the unforgivable act but of the woman herself.

She thought of the light she’d possessed in all those years of childhood, in the thin arms and the pale skin so much like Anatole that it brought a smile to her lips. She remembered the fondness in how she doted on her children – _wise Ippolit, strong Hélène, and Anatole. Her sweet and beautiful Anatole, her simple Anatole, her idiot Anatole._

She smiled at the thought of her mother’s free spirit, how Anatole mirrored its wildness and passion, and then she thought of closed rooms and locked doors, and the doctors that did not know the causes of such sadness.

She frowned and she thought of cyanide and empty glasses, and it had been Anatole that found her when she fell ill. She bit her lip and she realized with cold contemplation that she did not know the kind of grief one must experience to decide to end it all. She sighed and she thought that she might be starting to understand.

“Hélène-“

She startled from her thoughts and pushed them down as absurdity, “Yes? Is it – are we leaving?”

“If you are done,” Marya answered. “As you are needed back to your manor and I am needed back to my own, yes.”

 _‘Please_ ,’ Hélène thought as she stood from the pews.

 _‘Please_ ,” She thought as she wrapped herself up in the coat of her idiot husband.

 _‘Let this be a better day,’_ She thought as she followed Marya out the door. _‘Please.’_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did promise that Marya would come back like eight chapters ago or something. We are slowly but surely advancing this plot.


	23. Chapter 23

“What do you remember of yesterday?”

Tired wither in blue eyes met his gaze before slipping behind closed eyelids once more in sluggish blinking as Anatole groaned. He said nothing, as if even the languished pull into a vertical position was too much.

Anatole offered no words; Anatole only yawned.

Dolokhov had been expected as much. Anatole had never been a morning person, never found the joys in sunrises and idioms of early birds never agreed with him. Conversation this early in the morning alluded him on the best of days and best days had alluded them all for a long time now.

A warm mug was pushed into Anatole’s sleepy vision and held there until his brain had time to comprehend what it was and took hold of it. Once Dolokhov was sure that the mug was secure in spider-like fingers, he clanged him own glass against it and announced, “Tea. Drink it.”

Anatole hummed absentmindedly and yawned once more before sipping from the mug. It was not until Dolokhov forewent his chair and took up residence on the bed beside him that Anatole said anything.

He gestured with a lazy wave of his hand and yawned once more, “What…you, chair?”

“Problem?” Dolokhov asked as he sipped from his own mug. “You will have to move me if you do.”

Anatole’s eyes drifted back to the depths of his tea and he sighed tiredly. No words passed between them for long minutes before Anatole said softly, “You tried to hurt me.”

“What?”

“Your question,” He yawned. “You tried to hurt me.”

“So, it is nothing that you remember then?” Dolokhov said flatly. “No one wished to hurt you and no one did.”

“You did,” He replied, resting the mug against his blanketed knee as he removed one trembling hand from it with cautious care. He held the limp into the air, allowing the oversized sleeve to fall back and reveal the rows of light bruising on his dainty wrist, his breakable wrist. “Hurt.”

“Had you been capable of rational thought and willing to listen to reason than I would not have had to restrain you,” He justified. “You were pulling at your hair and scratching your face, and you threw plenty-“

“It is – _how_ is it m-my fault?” He asked, sarcasm breaking through the early morning fog with all the glory of a raging fire. His brows pulled together into something like hurt, like irritation, a dull rage as if even he had grown tired to his own anger. “I did not as _ktt_ t-to be h _ur_ t.”

“No one was trying to hurt you.”

Anatole scoffed but offered no words as he resumed drinking from his mug. He needed not to offer anything, Dolokhov could see by the set of his jaw, the pull of his brows, and the way he started blankly at the middle distance between them that he did not believe him.

“The pain was severe,” Dolokhov reported. ahis voice soft and even, as if to lure Anatole into listening before reacting. “I do not know if you remember it. I do not know what it is that you _do_ remember but if it is your actions than you must understand my reasoning for drastic measures. It was never my intention to cause you any harm but you were hurting yourself, I only wished for you to stop.”

Anatole had never been an angry person. His mind was too simple to maintain the fire needed, his spirit too free to carry it, and naivety too grand and great. He’d always believed that life was far too short to hold onto grunges and when you lived form one adventure to the next than everything was fleeting, anger was felt and forgotten. There were no hard feelings kept.

Anatole was not living that life anymore, there was no extravagant party, no balls, no operas to show up late too. There was no drink to drown all indignities, no girls to forget your sorrows in, no music to carry the soul. There was nothing.

He found himself stuck, found himself too weak to pull himself from bed, from this manor and the feelings of his own inadequacies. He was left only with shaking hands and broken words, left only with the clear cracks in his perfect façade and in those cracks, anger grew and it flourished.

When the rarity of anger presented itself in Anatole, it was bright and dazzling, and it was gone in a flash. Anatole’s anger was a matchstick, was fireworks. It was there and glorious to behold, and then it was gone. It never lasted long, fleeting like all things were fleeting.

Now, it was here and it did not leave.

Like strong perfume and the smell of winter on the air, anger seeped into every breath, every word. It dug itself into all of his inabilities and infected his every thought and action. It coated his tongue and the back of his teeth, it lived on his stiff shoulders and in closed fist, and it raged in damning flames inside of him.

Anatole struggled with it because he had no defenses for long battles and strong wills, he did not know what to do with the heat and the fire but to burn and to burn those around him. It lived beneath his skin and it was there, it was always there.

Dolokhov watched as anger flared with bright offense in the shine of blue eyes. He watched as it flushed the sunken planes of his pale face and smothered out all that charming innocence. He watched the way bonds of long friendships and trust melted in its flames and how he became an enemy to fight and burn.

Dolokhov felt his own flickering rage dim in the wake of Anatole’s tired flames.    
You – you pushed me and – and h-hurt m’ arm,” He stuttered in the rush of frustrated words, growing more frustrated with his inability to speak. “And ‘Le – _Hélène_! She - where ith she?”

“She went to the market,” Dolokhov replied calmly, Anatole rolled his eyes. “It is not abandonment, she left a note. She said that she would not be long.”

“She s-says – she says a lot,” He muttered darkly before pushing his mug onto the overcrowded side table. He pushed himself up with his cut hands before hissing and falling back into the bed.

Dolokhov watched Anatole’s internal struggle and the realization that, whatever his plan, he was too weak to fulfill it. He would not ask for help when the flames were this bright so he didn’t. He sunk back into the sheets and turned his back, “I am goin’ t’sleep. Leave.”

“No,” Dolokhov replied, watching the way Anatole’s shoulders stiffened and his breathing ceased for tense seconds before continuing. “You may wish to be alone but you have answered little of my questions and I refuse to leave until I am satisfied that you will not keel over upon my exit. It was not just your sister that you worried yesterday.”

Anatole shot him a deadly look and spoke in a flat monotone that might as well as been dead for all it sounded, “You have asked n-no questions.”

“What do you remember of yesterday?” He repeated, setting down his own mug to grab the bowl of oranges he took from the kitchen. He nudged Anatole with it until the prince turned to him and took it. “You can answer while you eat. I know you enjoy citrus fruits, enjoy those.”

His question was left hanging between them with little care for the ways it fell onto deaf ears. There was no answer offered, no answered ignored, it was just forgotten in favor of a laser-like focus onto the fruit, and only the fruit.

Dolokhov watched with quiet fascination how anger gave way to hunger, and how the remains of sleep that clung to Anatole’s features dissipated as he tore into the fruit. He picked his mug back up and sipped from it as he watched Anatole devour the orange and the next one with little care for the peelings or pips.

There was a churning guilt that settled heavy in Dolokhov’s stomach and made his tea taste sour as his eyes flickered from the prince to the uncovered trays of untouched food. It settled with sickly realization that he could not remember the last time Anatole ate an actual meal, ate anything that was not forced into him nor thrown up.

He returned his eyes to Anatole’s hunched shoulders and his sharp teeth, and he became suddenly uncomfortably aware of the gauntness of Anatole’s features. He sat his tea down numbly, “How do you feel?”

He was offered only a noncommittal grunt as Anatole ripped into his third orange in so many passing minutes with his fingernails and his teeth. His attention focused only on the task at hand, eating with the fever of a man that had not seen food in days. Dolokhov was sure that his words did not so much as permeate Anatole’s thick skull.

“Will you stop?” He asked when his question yet again fell to dear ears, snatching up the last orange from the bowl before Anatole could reach for it. He was finally graced with the appearance of blue eyes and Dolokhov swallowed the guilt of depriving food from a hungry man. He needed his answers to set his mind at ease. “For a moment, if you will, speak with me. Are you still feeling pained?”

“May I have that,” Anatole inquired, reaching for the orange. “I w-want it.”

Dolokhov pulled the fruit out of reach, “The doctor provided me questions that I must ask you when you woke. You cannot have the fruit until you answer them.”

“I am hungry,” was Anatole’s simple reply as he turned back to the half-peeled, half-eaten fruit in his hand, he made quick work of the rest of the peel before shoving slices into his mouth. “May I have it now?”

“Finish what you have,” Dolokhov sighed even as he placed the fruit in Anatole’s waiting hand. He paused, “Go slow and do not choke.”

Anatole rolled his eyes but complied all the same. Dolokhov attempted his questions once more, “Is there anything else that you remember, Anatole?”

“Hélène made me sick.”

“Hélène was… her methods were – they lacked good judgment,” Dolokhov said slowly. “She was wrong in her execution but she was not purposely trying to make you sick.”

Anatole rolled his eyes again and tossed the orange back to Dolokhov with unnecessary force. His voice dropped into a slow monotone as stubborn annoyance overtook his face. “I have gr-grown tired of her ex-excuses and yours for her, and my- my stomach has grown weak from it. I am done.”

“Starving for sake of a _point_ is the dumbest thing you have done, Anatole,” He sighed, knowing even as he says the words that he was only solidifying Anatole’s decision. “Hélène was wrong, I understand that but-“

“Hélène does not wish to ever be wrong,” Anatole croaked in his eerie monotone. “The truth bends to her will and – and we do as well. No more.”

“Anatole-“

“Do not wish to speak of Hélène,” He said in a rush, the words running together in something almost undistinguishable. “I do not wish to speak to her.”

The air hung thick between them for only a moment before winter swept the room. It was cold in all the ways Anatole should never be, all the ways so unnatural, and clear, and wrong. Dolokhov sighed, feeling all the aches that came with age, long winters, and the hardship of battle and service. He sighed with the kind of exhaustion that came with giving up, “Aren’t you tired, Anatole?”

“Eh?”

“Aren’t you tired of being angry all the time?”

Anatole clenched his jaw, eyes dropping down to the sea of navy blankets and a frown pulled at his pretty face, “Yes.”

“All you have to do is let go to it,” Dolokhov said softly, taking one of Anatole’s clenched fist and uncurling his fingers. “Just let go, alright?”

“I – I don’t know how,” He admitted, and then admitted nothing else as he pulled Dolokhov close into a soft embrace and held on. Dolokhov the assassin, Dolokhov the anchor.

He had never denied Anatole anything that he wanted, that he needed, and he would not start today.

 

“Anatole?”

Hélène’s voice was as timid and soft as her footsteps, as silent and gentle as she eased the door shut behind her, and it was nothing as it should have been. It was wrong, it hung in the air and it was wrong.

The air felt soft, warmed by sunlight and fuzzy around the edges as Hélène’s brown eyes drifted from Dolokhov sleeping form propped against the headboard to Anatole’s narrow shoulders sitting in the chair by the window. The sunlight danced through blond hair as Hélène stepped forward, “Brother?”

“It is snowing,” Anatole said simply, violin held to his chest the way childhood toys were kept close for comfort. He held it by the neck, plucking absentmindedly at the strings in no discernible pattern. “I like the snow.”

“I know.” She smiled as she stood slightly behind the chair. “You and Mama used to play for hours in it, I thought you’d freeze through.”

“You worry too much.”

“And you too little,” She replied. She took it as a good sign that he didn’t shake her hand from where she rested it on his shoulder, that he did not tense as she took a seat on the arm of the chair and wrapped her arms around his thin frame.

She rested her cheek against his soft hair and said nothing. She inhaled the moment and the scent of citrus fruit, enjoying it for all its worth and glory.

“I am still angry with you.”

“I know.” She took his hand carefully in her own and she asked of him, “Will you come with me?”


	24. Chapter 24

“Anatole used to help Mother in the kitchen when cooking fancied her,” Hélène said with arms crossed as she leaned against the doorframe. She had no need to look behind. In the days in which the only noise in a lifeless house were the footfall of a restless soldier, she knew those footsteps well.

Hélène’s voice held a lightness to it that he had not heard in so very long, “He used to follow her everywhere, it was only natural that she would put him to work.”

“I know,” Dolokhov said softly, taking up the space against the doorframe opposite her. He peered into the kitchen with the unnatural grace of trepidation on his face.

It was clear to Hélène as the lines on his face that Dolokhov did not think it wise to give a man with so little control over the shaking of his hands a sharp knife and a bundle of carrots to cut. Dolokhov said nothing of it.

He pressed his lips together and let the matter fall unvoiced, “He spoke of her on occasion, abroad during the war. She seemed lovely.”

“She was not,” Hélène told him bluntly and then sighed, “Just to Anatole. They were alike in many ways.”

Something like a ghost of a smile flickered onto Hélène’s face, fragile and transparent, hovering somewhere between fondness and frowning as she spoke, “Hopelessly naïve, the both of them, awfully charming and short-sighted. Giving way to their fancies far too easily, pretty heads in perfume clouds, it was at times ridiculous.”

Dolokhov watched the way Hélène’s smile wavered, the way her eyes never left her brother, “She used to run through the snow barefoot, without a coat.”

Hélène’s smile pulled into a frown and her eyes darkened only for a moment and then she smiled again, the way good princesses always did, “She would take Anatole with her, they’d come home with muddy feet and slush ruining their clothes. He’d be soaked from head to toe, shaking like a leaf. I feared him to be frozen through, his lips were so blue.”  

“Papa used to,” She paused, a small kind of laughter seeping into her voice, “He used to be so outraged by the sight of it. It was not the way of people with our wealth, he would tell her and she would always, every time, say with this innocence that I see in my brother, “why not.”

Anatole had always loved the snow, Dolokhov remembered fondly. He remembered the surveying missions in subzero temperatures and a snowball that was pelted at his head. He remembered his own indignant demands for the culprit and the idiot fool giving himself away. He remembered Anatole’s laughter, like a burst of sunlight in dreary skies, and the way it choked into snorting when he doubted over with little care for being caught.

He laughed at the thought.

“He cut the vegetables, mostly,” Hélène mused as an afterthought, smile returning to her face with gentle fondness as Anatole bit his lip with a look of concentration so rarely held on his face as he carefully sliced the carrots. “Papa used to get so annoyed. Anatole wouldn’t show up for his studies or violin lessons because he’d be in the kitchen with her. They’d sing.”

Her smile felt smaller than before, “I wish he would sing.”

“Hélène-“

“You were right,” She admitted, her eyes never wavering from the sight of her brother so Dolokhov did not allow his to wander either. “I was holding onto a hope that could never come to fruition, I see that now.”

“You do?” He asked skeptically, surprised. “…H-How?”

“I wanted things to return to as they were,” She continued as if he hadn’t spoken. “I did not realize that I had changed as well.”

“I am different,” She sighed, wrapping her arms tighter around herself. “I am stubborn in my ways, you know this. It is hard to admit that I have been wrong especially to a degree such as this but that is what I am doing. You were right.”

Dolokhov nearly snorted, nearly told her that to say that she was stubborn was to understand a hell of a lot but he didn’t. He asked instead, “Have you told him of this revelation yet?”

“I want him to be able to forget his limitations even if just for a moment,” She said after a pause in which they both watched Anatole, smiles curling on their faces as it had on his. “I wish him to be happy and I know…Anatole will never find happiness in his own limitations. He never had.”

“Teach him to be,” Dolokhov replied, an ease in his voice as if it was so easy to do so. “He looks to you for guidance, he came to you with his heartache after – after all of that, he would not have come to me or any other. He is who he is because hands molded him to be that way, mold him into something else.”

“It is not that easy.”

“You have always liked a challenge.”

She snorted, “That is not a challenge, Fedya, it is impossible.”

“It can be done,” He stated. “He wants you with him, Hélène. He wants to let go to all the resentment he is holding onto but he doesn’t know how. Show him.”

“Fedya.”

Dolokhov’s eyes shot up, meeting uneven blue ones, and a smile spread across his face at the correct pronunciation of his name, “Yeah?”

“Do you w-wish to help?” He asked, holding the knife out. “Or – or just stand there?”

“Why don’t you ask your sister?”

The smile on Anatole’s face dropped immediately and he looked away, back down to his cutting board. Dolokhov felt Hélène stiffen beside him, he did not need look to know that her smile fell as well.

He frowned, “Anatole.”

“I am – am all- almost _done_ ,” He stumbled, his words coming out in a hiss towards the end because of the frustration that burst in him. He accented his point with a cut of the knife, slamming it down as he cut more carrots than any meal could possibly need.

Dolokhov rolled his eyes; Kuragin stubbornness would be the death of him.

“Anatole.”

“I said I-“ Anatole broke off with a hiss, nicking his finger with the knife. He growled in frustration and no one was surprised when the knife clattered against the floor. “Damn everything.”

“That make you feel better?” Dolokhov asked dully as Hélène disappeared from the doorway. He beared the brunt of Anatole’s glare alone and he was not fazed. “Well, did it?”

“I am not a ch-child,” He snapped. “Do not – do not treat me as one.”

“Stop behaving as if you were,” Dolokhov snapped back as Hélène made her reappearance with bandages in her hands. Anatole pulled his bloody hand away from her when she reached for it, and Dolokhov rolled his eyes, “Oh yes, this is the very picture of maturity, Anatole, well done.”

 “Dolokhov, go,” Hélène said without looking at him, sitting the stuff down on the table. “You are not helping the situation and Anatole, give you hand before you bleed out on the floor.”

“It is not that severe.”

“And I was not asking a question,” She replied, holding her hand expectantly. “Let me see.”

Anatole’s eyes narrowed even as Dolokhov’s footsteps trailed off into silence, “You are not – not m-my mother.”

“Of course not, I am here and she is not,” She replied in a tone that was not harsh but felt as if it was. He flinched at the words though he did not understand why. “I care about more than just your gaiety, Anatole. Let me care for you, now.” 

Nothing passed between them for long pauses before Anatole uncurled his hand and held the blood appendage out for her. She took his hand in her own and cleaned the blood from it in silence.

“You’re angry,” Hélène noted and Anatole rolled his eyes, making a sound in the back of his throat as she finished wrapping the bandage around his finger. He turned away from her once she was finished, leaning against the counter.

She kept her eyes on the tight white knuckled grip he had on the marble stone, “You’re angry at me and you have every right to be.”

“You tr-treat me like ‘m s-stupid,” He managed, sending a glare to her. “Made of glass, ‘m not.”

“Smash the glasses on the floor.”

Anatole startled, his voice a clear and concise, “What?”

“You are angry, the world has wronged you, _I_ have wronged you,” She stated, her words felt mocking and he bristled at them but she pressed a decorative glass into his hand. “Smash the glass to the floor, Anatole. Destroy something pretty.”

“Hélène, I-“

“ _Smash_ the glass, Anatole,” She told him, her eyes held an alluring mischief in them, a manic kind of excitement, and Anatole felt it in his very being. Before he could speak, she grabbed a glass from the cabinets and threw it with strength.

It shattered and she laughed at the sound and the mess, and turned to her brother, “Anatole, do as I tell you.”

“These are – are P-Pierre’s,” He pointed out, fiddling with the cup in his hands. “Very ex-expensive.”

“Exactly. Smash it.”

He gave her a look and she gave him one back, taking hold of his wrist and holding the glass between them, “Fill the glass with your anger, Anatole, with your sadness. Fill it with everything you wish to rid yourself of and throw it to the floor, let it shatter into a million little pieces to be swept away and forgotten.”

“Let go of it,” She guided him, guiding his hand higher as her voice dipped into a whisper. “All you have to do is let go, brother.”

And he did.

The glass shattered and the one that followed, and laughter was manic and crazed, and it felt _good_. Colored decorative glass, crystal cut flowers and vines, and it was smashed so pretty against the floor until all that was left was the two of them.

When the last of the glasses hit the floor, Anatole was leaning more on her with his hand around her waist. It felt almost like home against his chest, feeling his laughter blow throw her hand, “You’re cute.”

She could hear the upturn of his lips and knew the tone, the charm, even before he spoke, “I know.”

“I don’t want to lose you, Anatole.”

“You will not, I had t-to take rest halfway to this v-very room and it is all but a sh-short walk,” He said plainly, weakness had always had a bitter taste when admitted. “It is I that has lost, you are sl-slipping from me.”

“I am never going anywhere,” She told him. “And if I am mad enough to wander, I will return to you always, brother. There is no other I could love the way that I love you.”

Anatole does not hug her so much as he collapsed into her, arms tight and encompassing, grabbing fistfuls of fabric as if she would evaporate if he did not hold her there. There were few times Hélène felt taller than her brother – bigger in presence, strength, and size – and they have never been good times.

She repeated the words she always had as the first sobs broke his lips, “Hush, Anatole, hush. I am here, I won’t leave you. Hush.”


	25. Chapter 25

Mosaics were a celebration of brokenness.

They were the physical manifestation in colored glass of all the things that could be broken and that could never be whole again. Hélène had always hated them.

Pierre’s father had been a man of driven passions, of a respect garnered from service and position, of a pompous love of art and wealth, and his  _talking_ of his love of the mosaics in the church house windows. He spoke in pretty prose of all those things that he loved most, of the stupid glass windows he had installed around the grant front doors of ever Bezukhov estate.

Hélène hated the windows so much, hated all that they were.

Broken.

There was weakness in the integrity of things put back together, there cracks in what could not be mended. Broken bones set never heal without aches, war barricades were abandoned when broken through, and cracks in pavement never really disappeared. They were just made pretty, just made weak.

Hélène had married at the desire of her father, because she was young but not too young that it was not expected of her. She married for money that would support Anatole’s lavish lifestyle without causing unneeded stress on her father’s aging heart, that would support her own. She married because she _had_ liked Pierre, liked his mind and enjoyed his conversation.

She had married for love, for what she thought might be love and what could grow into it but she found only boredom in married, only barely concealed antipathy for the whole ordea, and the feeling of being trapped.

When Pierre’s father had taken a more severe turn in health much quicker than they had expected and he had insisted on travel from their Petersburg home to that of Moscow for the opinion of doctors that could not save him, Hélène had packed a bag. She wrote to Anatole abroad, she ordered her affairs, and she wished her father his health and her love. She left her childhood home for a man she felt little for, and she grew discontented with her life.

She grew to resent Pierre and his ailing family, resent the loneliness in her chest and the longing she felt for a family so far away. She resented the glass, the poetry woven through the pieces of family and love when she had neither.

She resented the brokenness in the mosaics like she resented the brokenness in Kirill’s health. She resented Pierre, and his absence, and how he left her to tend to his father, to listen to his stupid words about the forever-bloomed roses that painted the windows as the man lied dying in his bed.

Hélène sat by the bedside of the elder Bezukhov and she listened as he spoke of the windows and their pictured stories. He would tell her with his cold hand in hers that the windows were beauty in imperfection, togetherness from the shattered.

She saw only broken shards of glass upon the kitchen tiled floor like those of glass windows, shining in the noonday sun like stars in the night sky. She laughed.

With all the pieces shattered and broken with Anatole’s thrown force, and frustration, and loss, they laughed, they cried with hearts like mosaics, and Hélène held on for life. There were tears in her eyes, seeping down her face and hidden in the depths of white blond hair, and Anatole bawled exhausted sobs, lost sobs.

She had not been happy in so very long, had not felt the settled warmth of it like hot drinks on winter mornings, like spring flowers brushing bare ankles, and the playing of the violin in the fuzzy morning breeze. She had felt only the absence of happiness in the hollowness that hugged her.

When the sobbing had subsided into the earie exhausted silence and they curled as well as they could on the limited counter space, eating cut carrots and uncooked doe, she found happiness once more.

She found a settled contentment that had escaped Anatole’s very essence for his entire life, found a serenity in the moment, a desire to stay where they were and not move with the spin of the Earth. She found peace in the eye of a hellish storm, found happiness in her brother’s arms and in his kiss pressed to her cheek.

She wished to live in the moment and only this moment, she did not want to move farther.

He pressed a kiss to her shoulder, to her jaw, and he hugged her with so many unspoken words. She hugged him back with a silent mantra, _hush, Anatole, I am here. I will not leave_.

She could not leave the country space even if she wanted to, neither could. They could not wander from the kitchen counters until the glass was swept from the floor. Anatole’s bare feet and her thin house slippers would leave them bleeding and cut if they attempted the walk to the door. There had been too much blood shed already and comfort was felt in space they had.

Glass could be mended and though Hélène found no purpose in the thought, she found a comfort in it. The mind was tricky and hands may tremble, solutions not as easy as fitted glass paneling, but Hélène found an assurance that Anatole could mend.

She could have her brother as he was before and the woman she a had been before that night and that study was a woman too far lost to be found. She found herself becoming at ease with who they were, what they changed into.

She was starting to accept the things that she could not change because broken things could remain beautiful when careful hands were mending them.

She had been so ugly, she realized. There had been a denial deep within her and a blackness that sickened rational thought, she realized much too late that trauma was turning her cold the way it was turning Anatole to violence.

The prospect of losing Anatole had never compared to the prospect of him being different, and it took her so very long to see it.

“You did not think this thought.”

His voice was soft, reverberating against her collarbone, and she could feel the amusement of his smirk. She rolled her eyes but smiled despite herself, “I was living in the moment, it won’t happen again.”

“Did not like it?”

“No, no,” She hushed him. “It is ill-suited for me, I will leave spontaneity to you but rest, let me have this moment.”

“Could n-not leave if I w-wanted to,” He smiled. “Glass.”

Hélène shifted slightly so that cabinet was not jabbing her in her shoulder blades without displacing Anatole much and she sighed, “Get comfortable, brother. If Dolokhov did not come at the sound of shattered glass, he will not return for a while.”

Anatole hummed and settled into her side as best he could, burying his face into her neck and he sighed. Minutes passed in a comfortable silence before being shattered by the soft rumble of his voice in the curve of her neck, “Hélène.”

She startled, “Yes?”

“What happened to P-Pierre?” He asked. “Where is he?”

“Anatole,” She sighed, petting his hair. “Don’t.”

Don’t speak, she wanted to tell him, let her enjoy this moment between them and the next. She wanted to beg that he drop his questions, accept the unanswered, and let her enjoy holding him and loving him. She wanted only to be lost to him, to forget their conflicts, forget the horror, and red, and the study that haunted her mind.

“Was it-“ He pushed away, nearly falling into the basin with the dirty dishes in his scramble to put distance between them. “Was it s-something I did-“

“Anatole.”

Something in Anatole’s shoulders shifted and his eyes thawed to something heartbroken, “It is me.”

“No, Anatole,” She told him firmly. “Pierre is-“

“Kind.”

It sounded almost as if he was accusing Pierre of it. Hélène pressed her lips together, “Okay.”

“He – he would not – not st-ay away,” Anatole stuttered, frustration seeped into his voice and his feet into the basin. “I did – what did I do wrong?”

“It is not you, Anatole, I swear it,” She told him softly, her own feet resting against his as she took his face in her hands. She kissed his nose softly, “You could do no wrong and no one could stay angry if you had, you know this. Pierre is simply not here.”

“You – you have…” Anatole trailed off, language tangling on his tongue. He pressed his lips together and then said slowly, “The coat.”

“Pierre _was_ here,” Hélène rephrased. “He leant me his coat in the weather but he is – he is not in the house and he has not been for some time. He is…studying, you know how that is. He gets wrapped up in his books and his drink, and nothing else matters. It is not you that is keeping him away.”

“Not _me.”_ Anatole’s voice held something accusing in it, something judgmental, and Hélène could have laughed at the familiarity of it. “What did _you_ d-do?”

“I did not a thing, Brother.”

“DO not lie to – to me, Hélène,” He huffed. “I know you are – you are keeping something from me and I – I don’t like it. I am – this makes me angry with you.”

“If it is apology you wish for wrongs you think I have committed against you then I will offer you apology, Anatole, but a lie has not passed my lips.”

“ _Think_?” He said incredulous. “Think! You – you _did_ wrong me.”

“Anatole, don’t be-“

“You are un-be-lievable,” He swore. “You treat me like I’m – I’m broken, like cracks in glass but I – I’m not made of glass, Hélène.”

“You don’t understand, Anatole,” She told him softly, complacently. “It is hard for me. I was there when – when you were thrown from – when it happened.”

It felt wrong to lie to him in this moment, “There was blood _everywhere_ , and you were so – so still and pale, and the doctors said that there was no hope that I would see your eyes again or hear your voice.”

“I do not want to lose you, Anatole,” She said softly. “I cannot lose you, any part of you that I have.”

“I am different.”

“I know.”

“You called me broken.”

“It was a lack of character and judgment,” She told him. “I regret ever having those words on my tongue, for having them pass your ears. As you have grown in strength, I have grown in wisdom so do not hold me to those words.”

“You h-have always been wise.”

“That is the only sensible thing you have ever said,” She told him. “Maybe reason had been knocked into that head after all.”

“All-always there,” Anatole told her slowly, an almost welcoming smirk on his lips. “I ig-nor it.”

There was a silence between them, broken by a very undignified snort from Hélène. A laugh cracked her face and she threw her head back, and Anatole could not hold in his own giggling at the sight of her.

“Seriously?”

They both paused, frozen half-folded over with their feet in the sink as Dolokhov stood standing with hands on his hips in the doorway. There was a look of deep incredulous on his face that bordered on humorous, Hélène and Anatole burst into laughter at him.

“Seriously?” He repeated, throwing his hands in the air. “Trust the Kuragins, you find camaraderie only in your destruction, is that it? Someone has to clean this mess up.”

“We are sorry,” Anatole told him, wide smile spreading his gaunt face. “Sin-sincerely.”

“So sorry,” Hélène echoed and they both laughed again.

“No, you are not,” He huffed, stomping over the glass as he moved around the room, muttering, “I should just leave you there, neither of you are ever sorry.”

“You are grumpy,” Anatole noted, an adoring slip of amusement falling into voice. It felt so simple to Hélène, the moment felt like all those times the three of them lounged in the drawing room with drinks and music. “Fedya.”

“No, no, I don’t want your explanation,” He waved off, swatting at him with the broom he found. “It will only be excuses.”

“You would ap-appreciate them,” He told him. “They are v-very good.”

Dolokhov rolled his eyes and then sighed, “Fine, let’s hear them.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mentioned at the end of the last chapter of The Fur Cloak but for people not reading that one, the reason for such a long wait was that finals almost quite literally murdered me.


	26. Chapter 26

Anatole was feeling well.

A fact known to Dolokhov regardless of how invested he wished to appear in his book because Anatole would not stop talking. It was all nonsensical prattle and inconsequential rubbish about nothing in particular. It was all pointless snippets of things muttered to himself, and calls for nothing more than the attention of the room’s sole other occupant, “Fedya.”

He sighed, not looking up from his book with a determined will, “Yes, what is it?”

If Anatole picked up on the slight ire that colored Dolokhov’s voice or the way his tone swung wearily at its wit’s end, he promptly ignored it. He pressed farther with a voice of airy lightness, “Are you lonely?”

“How could I possibly be, you have not given me a moment to myself since I retrieved you from the kitchen counters?” He replied. “Badgering me with incessant and inane talk because your sister slipped away.”

“She w-will be back with lunch,” He waved off in his slow concise tone, still managing to hold that usual soft allure. “And not what I mean – _meant_. You have no lovers to-“

“This is more inane chatter, you are aware,” He stated, letting the commanding tone of a superior officer slip into his voice. His eyes peered over the top of his book, warning held in a raised eyebrow, “I know that thinking wisely is not your suit but do so before you decide to carelessly offend me.”

“I mean no offence,” Anatole told him. “It is a simp-simple observation. You have – have spoken not of – of _any_ lover or of your Natalie-“

“This again?” He sighed. “Those letters were none of my own, I have told you this already, repeatedly. They were written as favor for one of your sister’s servants.”

“I do not believe that.”

“That so?”

“I believe all working males are married in this manor.” Anatole’s compensation for the lisp in his voice and the slur of his words sometimes dropped his voice into a cold mechanical tone, there was an absurdity in discussing such trivial matters in it. Dolokhov could not help but find it amusing.

“Or,” He continued unheeded. “Or, they are infatuated with my – my dear sister, I suppose. She has taken a – a liking to a few her-herself, it would be disheartening to assume she would not know.”

“What is this?” He asked suspiciously, eying Anatole with a certain level of wary amusement as the prince stared back unblinking and unabashed. It was prying, and there was nothing sudden about it.

It felt so… _familiar._ It felt like a pleasantly warmth in his gut in comparison to the heat of angry flames burning out his veins, in comparison to the encompassing thirst, _desire_ , need for a particular vengeance against a particular man. It was a feeling so full and complete, as if Dolokhov had been missing a piece of his soul and hadn’t realized it until it had slotted back into place.

He had missed Anatole, he realized. He had missed his friend, and despite his acceptance that he _could_ accept that he would not get that Anatole back, he thanked his lord and the next that there were still glimpses of him, that not everything could be stripped from him.

Dolokhov waved the though from his mind with a flippant hand wave, “Is this like the tales I was told of your childhood obsession with becoming an investigator.”

“An adventurer.”

“Yes, nothing came of it,” He replied easily, watching indignation color Anatole’s cheeks and pull his mouth into a pout. “This line of questioning will result in the same because I have no gossip to offer, they were not my letters.”

“I _am_ an adventurer!” He scoffed, offense flooding over any mischief in his features and Dolokhov chuckled. There had always been an ease in riling Anatole up. “I have tr-traveled as far as – as France in my youth and traveled with the army all – _all_ over Russia, with you at my side for part of it.”

“You hid in Poland from the war if I remember correctly.”

“I have been to Poland, too, thank you for m-mentioning that,” Anatole replied with narrowed eyes before adding, “I played to my strengths in my war time efforts, yes. Is that your point?”

“You mean you ran your mouth.”

A smirk crowded Anatole’s features, “It has always seen me out of my troubles.”

 _Until now,_ Dolokhov could not help to think, _until that damned study and Pierre’s big, big hands_.

He frowned and banished the thought from his mind, he knew not if he would have another conversation such as this and wished to savior it, “It has seen your way into the bedroom of every unwed woman in Moscow.”

“I…suppose that is not true,” Anatole reluctantly agreed and then laughed. Dolokhov could not help but join in even when Anatole grew serious once more, “Fedya, please, the tales of your Natalie-“

The intention was held still in the air and Dolokhov gave him an unimpressed expression, “Ask Hélène if you do not believe my words, I do not care.”

Anatole’s brows furrowed together as the conversation folded into a direction he did not wish for it to go. Dolokhov could see the gears turning inside of his head as he frowned, “No.”

“I was lead to believe that these childish games of yours had ended,” He stated. “Did you not find truce in broken dishes or was all my cleaning for nothing?”

“I did but-“

“Are you not less burdened now that you have spoken with your sister or do you wish to keep yourself weighed with it?” He asked. “You have never been one for masochism.”

“I am still not one,” Anatole said sharply in quick words that slurred on their ends as he stuttered, “I – cannot sp-eak of such benign and – and trivial matters just yet, to her. Not – not yet.”

Dolokhov’s own brows furrowed and he sighed, “I don’t understand, why not?”

“Because.”

“That is not a good enough reason now, nor as it ever been,” He stated plainly. “A statement you knew I would derive from such a response, you are stalling for time. Do us both a great favor, Anatole, and give whatever mundane reasoning you have.”

“It is of principle,” He stated princely. “I am a man of great principle.”

“Since when?”

“It is in my title.”

“Prince,” He stated. “ _Princ_ iple, you are ridiculous.”

Anatole grinned something lopsided and wholesome, something so very young and bright against the stark white of the bandages wrapped around his head and the pallor of his face, but the smile fell as all things did.

He swallowed hard, “I – I, uh, do not be-lieve that Hélène is always honest with me. I cannot tell when she is lying.”

“She is very skilled in that aspect.”

“Yes,” He agreed, nodding. “I think she is lying to me, still. I do not trust her.”

The warmth in Dolokhov’s gut cut out and dropped to a freezing winter, his smile fell to something serious, “What is it that you think she is lying about?”

“I do not think, I _know_ ,” Anatole said after a quiet moment. He took Dolokhov’s hand in his own, interlacing their fingers in a sweet embrace, “Fedya, I trust that – that you are honest.”

He thought of all the times in the past days that he _hadn’t_ been honest as he buried his guilt below his nod, “I have never chosen not to be.”

“Did I – did I anger Pierre?”

“Anatole-“

“Hélène s-said that I did not,” He explained, rushed and then slowed so that his voice was clear and concise. “But… P-Pierre is my _friend_ , I trust that he would – he would not abandon me with injury unless…”

Anatole frowned and Dolokhov’s wintery gut dropped below freezing. He prompted with baited breath, “Unless?”

“P-Pierre is too kind,” Anatole shook his head. “I must – I must have angered him in – in a way I remember not, before I f-fell from my horse.”

“I believe that any anger you could possibly have caused him would long be forgotten,” Dolokhov replied slowly, truthfully. “I do not think it is something that you need to worry yourself with, you have played no fault.”

“It is not I that have angered him,” Anatole hummed softly, as if he had already come to that conclusion himself. He rested his head against Dolokhov’s shoulder, settling into his side with their interlaced hands. “Has Hélène caused him to go? They…well, they do f-fight often with vicious words and biting swears, it is n-not hard to believe. What did you do to cause his absence?”

Dolokhov shrugged, “I do not know.”

“Did it to do with my injury?” He asked and when Dolokhov did not readily answer, “You do not have to pro-pro _tect_ her, you know? I know – I know the w-worst of her character and I love her still.”

“I know, Anatole, your heart has always been large,” He sighed. “I do not have the answers you wish for.”

Anatole sighed as if he had expected such an answer and he smiled sadly, “I wish to – to see Pierre, to hear his…wisdom. He is wise.”

“He cannot fix your hands,” Dolokhov told him, feeling the letter that had escaped the fireplace and found home in his pocket weigh like lead against his heart. “I know that you think he will be able to make you as you were but…”

“I don’t wish to discuss this,” Anatole told him, pressing a kiss to the side of Dolokhov’s neck as he snuggled closer. “Could you com-compose me a letter?”

“Should I address it to Pierre?”

“If you will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're mainly just wrapping up at this point which is kind of exciting and kind of sad. I am pretty sure that the next chapter will be the last for this one.


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyways, this has been sitting on my computer for months. So, woo. This sets it all back up to go back into the third section of I Pity You, I Pity Me's first chapter.

Hélène did not realize how much she had missed it until she heard it once more.

She had not felt the depths of what she had went so long without until it struck against her eardrum in toyed little melodies, until it caressed her heart in warmth before stabbing like sharp daggers with unforgiving _longing_.

It was pain she had not expected, that stopped her tracks and clenched her chest. It was a pain that nearly melted her eyes in flooded avalanches and she felt spun, dizzy with a pain she had been so numb to and hadn’t even realized it.

She had not realized how far into these trenches of yearning that she had lived for days and weeks, so deep as to swallow both soldiers and oceans. She had not even realized what had caused that aching echo in her otherwise shattered heart.

She followed the tinkered noise with an anticipation that filled unfillable trenches, filled void, and followed with a childish excitement and an unprincess-like joy. She followed on silent feet down forgotten halls and through forgotten rules.

She followed through faded rooms and dust that hung heavy in early morning sun through curtains fallen open. She followed through the fog of stale memories, old recalls of dancing feet doing this very same thing as a child and a teen.

It felt almost haunted, both in presence and present. As if she transcended her moments and experienced her happiest of them all at once with a pure euphoria, she walked through haunted halls. It did not halt her, sway her, and it would not.

She’d walk through battlefields if she was following that tinkered tune.

She stopped herself at a room on feet so silent, like a ghost and a song, she was barely there. She just listened through the door partly cracked open, watching the one white piano and the narrow frame sat on the bench with his back to the door. The piano and her brother felt stark against the dark cherry woods of the walls and the maroon velvet curtains blocking the sun. Her brother, her Anatole, and his white bandages wrapped around messy white blond hair and the tremble through hands that he could not stop, and yet, he felt whole in this moment.

She felt whole.

She felt a hopefulness that was encompassing, felt alive, and as if cracked hearts and broken brains could be mended by song.

The scale went again, a finger slipping off ivory keys.

There was a soft French curse and a deep breath before the scale ran again, and again, and again until perfection was not an art to strive for but a state of natural being. She felt a smile creep over her face, cracking her lips into rows of teeth as Anatole fleshed out something that she had never heard and did not believed every existed in the known world until this very moment.

“It is beautiful, my dear Anatole,” She stated after his playing ended. It caused him to startle, turning on the bench carefully. She smiled at the innocence to his surprise, “Honestly, Anatole. It is so lovely to hear.”

“It was – I was jus’ tinkering, Hélène. N-Nothing more.”

“And nothing less,” She said, refusing to brush off this moment as meaningless or unimportant. “I know that you have not done anything such as this since – well, since the incident with your violin and I applaud you. This turn out is much more enjoyable for both me and the instruments.”

He gave her a pained weary look, and she assured him, “This is not pity, I would not offer you such. This is joyous, I am happy. I wish that you would have told me that you were going to play.”

“I am not – good,” He said harshly, honestly, because he wasn’t. He was not at the caliber as he had once been, nor at the caliber that he had been at when he was twelve but Hélène did not care.

She did not care at all.

“It was beautiful to me,” She told him, “I care not if you only know basic scales or if you knew nothing at all and were tapping at keys in random nonsense, it is a song worth of gods, and one worthy of my ears.”

“That is – much.”

“It is the truth,” She said primly, “It is beautiful to me and I insist that Dolokhov be present to hear it. Where must he be?”

“He is out,” Anatole said, turning back to the keys. “He said that he had errands to run of some sort. I believe I saw him write a letter.”

 

When empty of grand parties and young princes, the Bolkonsky was a garnished eye sore. It was _suck_ , a blackhole that sucked life and joy of all that crossed the threshold. All who entered churned back out on the street plain and sad.

Pierre was no different.

Dolokhov had watch his nervous but determined steps from the moment that he left his tiny room at the Inn. He had watched as paced the marketplace with indecision and then headed headstrong and confident into that sad Bolkonsky castle.

He watched him return heavy with letters, dejected and sad, leaving young Bolkonsky standing stoic at the door. Dolokhov watched him, arms crossed and hand clenched, and he followed the sad old man’s bulking frame through the crowded streets and down the paved roads.

Watching, and waiting. Stalking with the concentration and focus that they hunted bears down with, the way they followed the trails of wounded French soldiers through thick snow.

He followed, his own breast pocket weighed down like lead with a well-meaning letter and loose bullets.

A pistol holstered to his side.

His anger that he had kept so well-restrained and well-maintained, that he’d coveted for so long that he felt it hot in his gut, poured and overfilled, and flooded every essence of his being. He burnt in every step his feet took and flamed like a fire that destroyed until it was all that was left of him.

He _was_ anger. He was fire.

He was Dolokhov the assassin, the bold, the deadly. He was six shiny bullets in the chamber and a twitchy trigger finger. He was Anatole’s friend and he was _pissed_.

He fed the fire with gasoline memories, turned the blaze into an inferno, and let it devour him into the cold assassin that he was. His mind turned out images of blood beneath fingernails and satin stained red, of shaking hands and untouched violins, of lost memory and migraines, and _Anatole_. The Anatole that he lost, that would not return to him.

He knew that he was okay with his careless prince tarnished, that he was grateful for the parts that he still held. He did not care that Anatole was different now, but he cared of deep retribution.

It was an eye for an eye and Dolokhov would take Pierre’s for the one Anatole lost. He swore that sentiment to himself as Pierre turned the key in the lock to his room at the Inn, he pledged to the fact as he removed his gun from its holster, he vowed to his god and Pierre’s as he pressed the barrel into small of his large back.

Pierre’s voice was calm and only fanned his flames, “My purse is empty.”

Dolokhov’s voice was gruff and voice, that of a solider, an assassin, a killer, “Open the door.”

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t think that Anatole actually takes his coat with him at the end of Pierre & Anatole but that thought didn’t occur to me until after I wrote it into the story so, whatevs. Marya wouldn’t know either way.


End file.
